Reflection: Learning Theories Wiki

After an initial struggle in understanding what was required for this task and eventually discovering the topics that appeared hidden, I finally found the wiki, understood its structure and therefore could begin to actually contribute. By this time however, most others had already contributed and all topics were taken. So I chose to simply add onto what had already been discussed. The experience had for this wiki was quite stressful as it was often not viewable due to its settings, which could only be changed by the instructor. Ultimately, this activity didn’t necessarily run as smoothly as it could have. From that, however, a valuable lesson was learnt – learning may be problematic, it can often be messy and ill-defined, this can be part of the lesson, problem-solving and overcoming barriers in order to reach a final result and successfully do the job.

Being a wiki, it again provided the opportunity for collaborative learning (constructivism). The scaffolding of the wiki was through the use of the learning strategy PMI (plus, minus, interesting), a method used for stimulating lateral and creative thinking. Its purpose is to make the student see both sides of the argument, to think broadly and suspend judgement in order to make informed decisions. This strategy is an excellent one that can be used in the classroom to support learning as it stimulates higher order thinking. Each outlook is dealt with one at a time creating like a mind map for students (cognitivism). In this particular wiki, pairs were asked to select one of many topics resulting in students being more informed in their chosen topics and less informed in the others. Although the PMI’s of other the topics were accessible to all students, if the need for further explanation was required the opportunity to approach others that studied that area was possible (connectivism).
The design of this activity supports a diverse range of students as it can be used working individually, in pairs or as a group and can be used in all areas of learning, for any topic.