I enjoy reading your opinions Greg. It is fascinating how you selectively pick at things and avoid others to bolster your argument. Why choose to focus on a short practitioner journal article if you want more references/evidence, why not choose one of many peer-reviewed international journal article from Sullivan that is in more detail with supporting evidence and references? If you had read these articles you would know what Student-centred STRUCTURED inquiry lessons incorporate explicit teaching practices. But nope, that doesn't help you with your argument. You would also know that there are strategies that overcome cognitive load theory with the structured approach, but again, nope no mention of this here either. I love how Sweller argues against discovery learning as if everyone is doing this. No-one in the math community is advocating for it and i'm yet to see a teacher do this in the math classroom, but Sweller likes to references this (as well as you) to bolster your argument. Oh and a repeated (and tiresome) argument is comparing reading research to maths as it if is transferable. Hattie highlights the effect size is almost half for maths, than what it is for literacy. I would suggest doing more homework before sharing opinions with weak arguments. But then again I do enjoy reading these blog posts that highlight how little understanding people have of structured inquiry lessons and interchangeably referring to them as discovery learning.
Sarah wouldn’t all the words you wrote be far far more useful and carry some weight beyond an opinion if you provided a minimum of one quote and reference to the papers you refer to?
As you claim to be an avid reader of Greg’s work you must know he has covered a lot of detail on this over the years and simply asserting he has missed something makes you look far worse than the complaint you make here.
If Sullivan did a poor job in the paper being discussed that is on Sullivan not Greg.
Interesting to contemplate what is going on in the minds of those proposing that to get students to become independent learners you must start them trying that from day one. So many examples Greg shows here of motivated thinking that seems to start from this premise that independent learning has to be front and centre.
It seems they need proof and assurance that the ability to learn independently can and will be developed. Without that they’ll find reasons to justify worse methods for teaching particular material no matter what.
What seems ironic to me is that most students don't develop the ability to learn independently, no matter what instructional method is used. How many people engage in self-taught mathematics once they leave school? Almost nobody, I'd wager. If you aren't taught it in school, then it's likely you'll never get it.
This is going to be a matter of degree. While most high school graduates are better than students entering high school most still benefit a lot from guidance. Even professors attend conferences to hear people present papers. Presumably they find this a better use of their time than just reading the papers.
I enjoy reading your opinions Greg. It is fascinating how you selectively pick at things and avoid others to bolster your argument. Why choose to focus on a short practitioner journal article if you want more references/evidence, why not choose one of many peer-reviewed international journal article from Sullivan that is in more detail with supporting evidence and references? If you had read these articles you would know what Student-centred STRUCTURED inquiry lessons incorporate explicit teaching practices. But nope, that doesn't help you with your argument. You would also know that there are strategies that overcome cognitive load theory with the structured approach, but again, nope no mention of this here either. I love how Sweller argues against discovery learning as if everyone is doing this. No-one in the math community is advocating for it and i'm yet to see a teacher do this in the math classroom, but Sweller likes to references this (as well as you) to bolster your argument. Oh and a repeated (and tiresome) argument is comparing reading research to maths as it if is transferable. Hattie highlights the effect size is almost half for maths, than what it is for literacy. I would suggest doing more homework before sharing opinions with weak arguments. But then again I do enjoy reading these blog posts that highlight how little understanding people have of structured inquiry lessons and interchangeably referring to them as discovery learning.
Sarah wouldn’t all the words you wrote be far far more useful and carry some weight beyond an opinion if you provided a minimum of one quote and reference to the papers you refer to?
As you claim to be an avid reader of Greg’s work you must know he has covered a lot of detail on this over the years and simply asserting he has missed something makes you look far worse than the complaint you make here.
If Sullivan did a poor job in the paper being discussed that is on Sullivan not Greg.
Interesting to contemplate what is going on in the minds of those proposing that to get students to become independent learners you must start them trying that from day one. So many examples Greg shows here of motivated thinking that seems to start from this premise that independent learning has to be front and centre.
It seems they need proof and assurance that the ability to learn independently can and will be developed. Without that they’ll find reasons to justify worse methods for teaching particular material no matter what.
What seems ironic to me is that most students don't develop the ability to learn independently, no matter what instructional method is used. How many people engage in self-taught mathematics once they leave school? Almost nobody, I'd wager. If you aren't taught it in school, then it's likely you'll never get it.
This is going to be a matter of degree. While most high school graduates are better than students entering high school most still benefit a lot from guidance. Even professors attend conferences to hear people present papers. Presumably they find this a better use of their time than just reading the papers.
His slides look like crap. Not that that's the most important thing! But I expect better marketing materials for the snake oil. ;-)