What does one need to know if he or she takes it upon
him/herself to seek change in a local school, school district, or at the state
level?[1] Given the resources necessary to influence
public policy, I would suggest that any effort to institute change by average
citizens would probably be limited to local targets, for example, at a
particular school or a school district.
And when one is talking about effective curricular changes, irrespective
of one’s resources, one has to penetrate the psyches of a particular school’s
staff, comprised of the professionals who will actually effectuate the change
effort. This blog has addressed how difficult
such an effort is, especially if one is considering change beyond minor
modifications; that is, any meaningful curricular change such as changing the
scope of a particular subject that calls for transformational change.
My focus of late in this blog has been to look at some of the
factors that would be important to such a potential or actual change process. To date, I have addressed curricular
philosophies and approaches. My next
topic, psychology, is a central concern to all of education, for after all,
learning is a mental process. In this
posting, I want to make a few introductory remarks that provide an overview for
what is to come. I warn you: my comments on the relationship between
psychology and education will be cursory at best – volumes have been published
in this field. My aim, as with
philosophy and approaches, is to give you a set of parameters and bits of language
that you, as a change agent, are apt to encounter.
Assuming one is
seeking curricular changes that result in students learning important material,
the psychological factor is obviously important. Teachers are constantly making psychological
assumptions about their students and the parents and administrators with which they
deal. Some of those assumptions are well
ensconced within their individual world views.
If they are certified by the state, they have had college level courses
in developmental psychology and in various learning theories. Mix that knowledge with the individual biases
anyone brings to a social setting and you have the particular assumptions and
beliefs any particular teacher might have about his/her professional
responsibilities. The viewpoints held by
those who attempt to design and implement change and of those teachers and
school staff members affected by any change effort will be crucial in their attempts. Unfortunately, the less sophisticated aspects
of such beliefs – the intuitive component – often prove to be misguided. These beliefs are often highly influenced by
cultural biases, both generally or those particular to a social environment
such as a school site or, more specifically, a classroom. That is, in order to be effective, one cannot
neglect all sorts of biases and misconceptions any group of school personnel,
either individually or collectively, might have.
While this blog cannot address all these possibilities, it
can look at what generally these teachers have been taught concerning learning
theories. This should give the potential
or actual change agent a starting point by which to assess the psychological
parameters those individuals at the school or school district share. I deem this as useful knowledge for it gives
one an insight into the language one is likely to encounter among teachers when
they discuss instruction and/or other social interactions that typify school
life.
Along these lines, Allan C. Ornstein and Francis P. Hunkins
offer the following questions that a curricular specialist would ask in order
to do his/her job:
Why do learners respond as they do to
the efforts of the teachers? What are
the impacts of cultural experiences on students’ learning? How should curriculum be organized to enhance
learning? What impact does the school
culture have on students’ learning? What
is the optimal level of student participation in learning the various contents
of the curriculum?[2]
As with any similarly broad concerns, it is inevitable that
different people will arrive at different answers to these questions. Since ultimately psychology is a study of
humans and such study has proven deficient in being able to predict human
behavior, there have developed different schools of thought concerning learning
and other school related activities.
This variety will also parallel what this blog has already reviewed in
terms of both curricular philosophies and curricular approaches. That is, as we look at the major groups of psychological
theories, you will be able to discern how the various philosophies and
approaches rely on how learning is variously described and explained by these different
schools of thought.
Before reviewing these groups of theories, let me make a
comment about the state of psychological research. Current efforts at advancing our
understanding of how we think, make decisions, learn, and carry out other
mental functions are being assisted by very exciting, new technologies. Many learning theories and other explanations
originated from a time when these newer research tools were not available – I
will attempt to point out how this deficiency affected early conclusions and
viewpoints. These technological
advancements are the various resonating machines that allow us to look inside
the brain as it is stimulated by different types of information and other
sensations. Specifically, these machines
include computerized tomography or CT (originally called CAT) which utilizes
X-rays that scan cross sections of the brain; positron-emission tomography
(PET) which traces how sugar in the blood flows in the brain; and magnetic
resonance imaging (MRI) which, with the use of radio waves, gives a researcher
insight on how the brain analyzes information and how blood flows correlate
with different brain activities. While
all of this does not indicate what the mind is thinking – we can’t “read” what a
person’s thoughts are – it does give suggested information as to what sort of
thinking is being stimulated by being able to see what sections of the brain
are “lit” up with varying stimuli. These
sections are then matched with certain types of thinking and feeling, such as analysis,
fear, or happiness. Surely, such
research is based on interpretation, but it does give researchers tools that advance
knowledge appreciably from what was possible before these technologies were
available.[3]
But even before these machines were introduced, there was the
recognition that psychology should be central to our study of curriculum. Two scholars who gave this aspect of learning
a prominent place in their works were Ralph Tyler and Jerome Bruner, who
recently passed away, four months short of his 101st birthday. Tyler, in his curriculum development model,
identified a developer’s view of psychological factors as one of his “screens”
that will have an effect on the sequence of the learning experiences his
curricular plans propose. Bruner
associated thinking styles with the demands of various academic subjects such
as, for example, distinguishing between when analytic thinking is prominent as
opposed to creative thinking. These
styles are influential in the resulting structure of knowledge that the various
disciplines have developed. In short,
psychology plays a central role in curricular development both in terms of
content and process.[4]
So what are these various schools of thought? Ornstein and Hunkins list three groups of
psychological theories that have had influence on curricular development. They are behaviorist or association theories,
cognitive-information processing theories, and phenomenological and humanistic
theories. I would also add
psychoanalytic theories. In the upcoming
postings, I will describe these groups and point out the distinguishing
emphasis each of these has. For example,
behaviorist theories highlight the effects that reinforcements and rewards have
on learning and motivation. This
emphasis can be distinguished from cognitive information theories’ emphasis on
developmental aspects of learning and motivation. Each of these groups has provided meaningful
insights as to what needs to be taken into account when curriculum and
instructional decisions and activities are carried out. In turn, changes in curriculum, in order to
be viable, need to take into account the relevant psychology that affects
accomplishing the learning outcomes being sought.
[1] By way of context, this is how our school system is
divided administratively. There is an
added layer, the US Department of Education, but that level is mostly advisory and
supplemental. Our federal system places
squarely on the states the obligation of providing a public school system and
the responsibility of regulating all educational efforts, public and private,
within a state.
[2]
Allan C.
Ornstein and Francis P. Hunkins. See
Ornstein, A. C. and Hunkins, F. P.
(2004). Curriculum: Foundations,
principles, and issues. Boston,
MA: Allyn and Bacon, p. 99.
[3] Sousa, D. A. (2001).
How the brain learns, 2nd ed.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
[4] Op cit., Ornstein and Hunkins.
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