Learning Theory Online Resources

There is much written about the learning process. The following online resources attempt to provide an overview and additional resources on specific topics relating to learning theories.

The University of Kentucky Teaching and Academic Support Center provides a very concise and simple page to start your research into learning theories and gives practical information that can be used immediately in the classroom. The following is an excerpt from the UKTASC web page which is a clear and concise definition of the information processing theory.

Information processing theory states that to learn something new, learners:

1. Focus attention on the new material,
2. Compare it to old material already in long term memory, and
3. Either add the new material to the old material or create new mental categories for new material that does not fit in any established mental category.

The next excerpt from UKTASC is a practical guide to how to help your students move new information from working memory to long term memory.

You can help your students to improve their ability to process information.

1. Identify the key features to be learned. Define important concepts in their most essential terms.
2. Focus students’ attention on important concepts – highlight the main ideas. Be selective about the ideas you offer. Giving too much material will make the situation worse by overloading working memory.
3. Help your students attach new information to what they already know. Organize your information into categories. Fill in details that elaborate on the concepts. Give examples. Ask students to suggest connections among new and old material.
4. Give students practice in using new information. This needs to happen during a lecture as well as in homework. After defining, highlighting, and elaborating on a concept, ask the students to do something with it, like solve a short problem, write a sentence, draw a picture. Giving them two or three different kinds of tasks that use the same information is even better.

http://www.uky.edu/TASC/ED/cognitivetheory.php

http://www.asa3.org/ASA/education/think/methods.htm

This thorough web page by the American Scientific Affiliation briefly discusses problem solving, creative and critical thinking, multiple intelligences and learning styles, and teaching problem solving skills. It also provides numerous links to resources covering each of these topics. The following insightful excerpt was found on this web page.

In design, a problem is any situation where you have an opportunity to make a difference, to make things better. Whenever you are thinking creatively and critically about ways to increase the quality of life (or to avoid a decrease in quality), you are actively involved in problem solving. Although the term "design" is used most often in art (for graphic design) and engineering, the process of design occurs in all fields and in everyday life.

Glossary of Educational Technology Terms

This link takes you takes you to Sara Flanagan's web site hosted at Purdue University. As a class assignment Flanagan created a web site dedicated to defining educational terms and technology tools that are used in education. This is a great resource for those just starting out in the field of educational technology or instructional design. Flanagan's site is well organized and the definitions are easy to understand.

http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~smflanag/edtech/cip.htm

Welcome to my Instructional Design Idea blog. I am excited to exchange ideas with my classmates as well as professional Instructional Designers. Our first assignment was to visit, review and post links to interesting blog sites. The following blogs offer a variety of information of interest to professional instructors as well as instructional design students.

http://edublogs.org/ Edublogs.org is a great site to find ideas for instruction and to network with other teachers. Edublogs.org starts beginners off with a list of 10 ways you can use blogs in and out of your classroom. I have maintained a classroom blog for two years and there are still ideas in this top 10 list I had not considered.

http://www.sjeds.com/ This link is an example of how a blog is used at my school. The front page of the blog is controlled by the front office. Current news and announcements are found here as well as information for people looking for a school. Down the right column is a list of classroom and resource teachers which link visitors to the classroom blogs. Students and parents are supplied with an id and password to access the teacher's blogs. On these blogs, we post homework, student work, pictures of special events, and announcements. Students like having a central place for announcements and homework lists. Discussion prompts and story starters are posted as well allowing the students to post comments and have discussions.

http://elearningconcepts.wordpress.com/ This is a great blog that contains links to many other Instructional Design blogs. It is maintained by Dr. Mary Nicholas at Bloomsburg University so is packed full of useful links and information. Through her blog I found the video that is posted below. This is a great blog with instructional videos describing the ways different technologies can be used in the virtual or physical classroom.

http://www.internettime.com/blog/archives/001083.html This is an archive of Jay Cross’ blog on instructional design. Jay Cross is an experienced Instructional Designer who helped design the first online learning programs. Pedagogy and design theory as well as practical information for Instructional Designers can be found on this blog. It has not been updated since January of 2009 so is not a site for conversation but rather reference site.

http://ideas.blogs.com/ Blog maintained by Ferdinand Krauss for the purpose of sharing ideas and discussing elements of Instructional Design. A very professional blog with many links to articles on the pedagogical use of e-learning. This is a blog which encourages conversation about Instructional Design.

Finally slash.com is a great place to stay connected to the newest technology. People may subscribe through the RSS feed and specifically chose the fields you are interested in learning more about. This is a great place to learn about the newest technologies that can be used in instruction.

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