Designing an Intelligent Teaching Simulator for Learning to Teach by Practicing

Learning to teach is difficult for prospective teachers because of the complex nature of the work of teaching. Practicing (Lampert 2010), interacting with the practice of teaching from a first-person perspective, may give them a unique experience in learning to teach. Computer-based simulators in which the apprentice teacher can interact with virtual students may be used to create that kind of experience. In this paper, we show how to apply techniques in artificial intelligence to design an intelligent learning environment. We show how to model the apprentice’s decision-making and resources that can help him or her improve the practice of teaching.Work reported in this article has been done with the support of the U. S. National Science Foundation through grant ESI-0353285 to P. Herbst. All opinions are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Foundation. Both authors contributed equally to this work.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/78018/1/Intelligent_tutor-vmcph.pd

Impact of Critical Events in an Animated Classroom Story on Teacher Learners’ Online Comments

We examined the effect of reference to critical events in an animated classroom story on the quality of teachers’ comments in an online learning experience. We analyzed data using systemic functional linguistics and logistic regression. We found statistically significant evidence that participants made more reflective and evaluative comments and proposed more alternative teaching moves when they referenced critical events than when they did not. The study contributes to validating a theoretical distinction between reference point and reference object in the literature on video assisted, online teacher education: While attached reference objects help learners be more focused and productive, those qualities differ depending on reference points included in those reference objects. This study also provides preliminary evidence to support the practice of selecting clips that deviate from instructional norms when designing video-based professional learning opportunities.The work reported in this paper was done with the support of NSF grants ESI-0353285 and DRL-0918425 to Patricio Herbst.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/97551/1/Critical_Events_AERA2013_ChieuAaronHerbst.pdf-

DIRECTING FOCUS AND ENABLING INQUIRY WITH REPRESENTATIONS OF PRACTICE: WRITTEN CASES, STORYBOARDS, AND TEACHER EDUCATION

We discuss affordances and liabilities of using a storyboard to depict a written case of a teacher’s dilemma that involves race, opportunity to learn, and student community. We rely on reflections by the teacher educator who authored the written case and later depicted it as a storyboard to use it with his preservice teachers (PSTs). The analysis involved, first, organizing the signifiers in each of the two representations of practice into what we call concentric spheres of stratification, and secondly, contrasting the various meanings attributed to signifiers by both the author and his PSTs. We suggest that the resources of storyboard allow for more inquiry and alternative narratives than is available from the single modality of text in the written case.Work reported here has been done with the support of NSF grant DRL- 1316241 to D. Chazan and P. Herbst. All opinions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the foundation.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/143005/1/HerbstBoileauClarketalPMENA17.pdfDescription of HerbstBoileauClarketalPMENA17.pdf : Main Articl

Using comics-based representations of teaching, and technology, to bring practice to teacher education courses

This article situates comic-based representations of teaching in the long history of tensions between theory and practice in teacher education. The article argues that comics can be semiotic resources in learning to teach and suggests how information technologies can support experiences with comics in university mathematics methods courses that a) help learners see the mathematical work of teaching in lessons they observe, b) allow candidates to explore tactical decision making in teaching, and c) support pre-service teachers in rehearsing classroom interactions.Work described in this paper has been done with support of NSF grant ESI-0353285 to Herbst and Chazan. All opinions are those of the authors and do not represent the views of the Foundation.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/78017/4/PHetal-Comics_RoT_share.pd

Constructivist learning : an operational approach for designing adaptive learning environments supporting cognitive flexibility/

Constructivism is a learning theory that states that people learn by actively constructing their own knowledge, based on prior knowledge. Many different perspectives exist on constructivist pedagogical principles and on how to apply them to instructional design. It is thus not only difficult to evaluate the conformity of existing learning systems with constructivist principles, it is also quite hard to ensure that a new learning system being designed will ultimately facilitate and stimulate constructivist learning. A critical characteristic often mentioned in learning systems is adaptability. That is, the ability to provide a learning experience that is continuously tailored to the needs of the individual learner. The present research aims to help designing truly constructivist and adaptive learning systems. For that purpose, it is necessary to clarify what constructivism entails in an operational manner: I propose a set of criteria for certain aspects of constructivism and use it both as guidelines for designing learning systems and for evaluating the conformity of learning systems with these constructivist principles. One facet often mentioned as being strongly relevant to constructivism is cognitive flexibility, meaning the ability to spontaneously restructure one's knowledge, in many ways, in adaptive response to radically changing situational demands. The claim I make in the present thesis is that the operational approach I proposed makes the design and use of adaptive learning environments supporting cognitive flexibility straightforward and effective. More specifically, the dissertation makes four main contributions to the interdisciplinary field of learning and e-Learning technology. Firstly, the thesis proposes operational criteria for cognitive flexibility and presents both justifications and examples of their use. The set of criteria may be used in different instructional situations for designing and evaluating conditions of learning. Secondly, on the basis of the criteria for cognitive flexibility, the thesis proposes an operational instructional design process and shows an example of its use. The process may also be applied in a variety of instructional situations for the design and use of learning systems fostering cognitive flexibility. Thirdly, the thesis introduces a new, open-source, domain-independent, Web-based adaptive e-Learning platform, named COFALE, and illustrates an example of its use. The platform may be used for designing adaptive learning systems supporting cognitive flexibility in various domains. And fourthly, the thesis reports on a preliminary evaluation of the example handled by COFALE with actual learners. The study provides a certain number of encouraging results for fostering cognitive flexibility by means of ICT-based learning conditions.(FSA 3)--UCL, 200

Vers une approche opérationnelle pour l’évaluation des EIAH

Constructivism is a learning theory which states that people learn by actively constructing their own knowledge, based on prior knowledge. A significant number of ICT-based constructivist learning systems have been proposed in recent years. A critical problem related to the design and use of this kind of systems has been the lack of practical means for evaluating the actual conformity of such systems with constructivist principles. Our research aims to help designing truly constructivist learning environments. For that purpose, we have proposed a set of operational criteria for certain aspects of constructivism and we have used them as a useful framework both for designing and for analyzing learning environments. In this paper, we present and discuss three approaches, including ours, which are based on criteria to facilitate the evaluation of constructivist learning environments.Le constructivisme est une théorie de l’apprentissage qui postule que l’individu apprend en construisant activement ses propres connaissances, sur la base de ses connaissances préalables, qu’il ajuste et modifie au long de son apprentissage. Plusieurs systèmes d’apprentissage constructiviste basés sur les TIC ont été proposés ces dernières années. Un problème critique relatif à la conception et l’utilisation de ce type de systèmes est la pénurie de moyens pratiques pour évaluer la conformité des systèmes existants avec des principes pédagogiques du constructivisme. Notre objectif de recherche est d’aider à concevoir et à utiliser des environnements d’apprentissage constructiviste qui mettent réellement en oeuvre les principes du constructivisme. Pour ce faire, nous avons proposé un ensemble de critères pour certains aspects fondamentaux du constructivisme et nous les avons utilisés comme un cadre utile pour concevoir et évaluer des environnements d’apprentissage. Dans cet article, nous présentons et discutons trois approches, y compris la nôtre, qui s’appuient sur des critères afin de faciliter l’évaluation des environnements d’apprentissage constructiviste.Vu Minh Chieu, Milgrom Elie. Vers une approche opérationnelle pour l’évaluation des EIAH. In: Sciences et Technologies de l'Information et de la Communication pour l'Éducation et la Formation, volume 14, 2007. Les Dimensions émotionnelles de l'interaction dans un EIAH/Analyses des traces d'utilisation dans les EIAH. pp. 9-44