Exploration and Emergence Institute 2003

(SURPRISE!)

a NO-technology morning.

We've all enjoyed playing w/ a range of computer simulations and programs this week, but now we'd like to show you how many of the ideas associated with emergence can also be explored off-line...

which is where we'll go this morning. So:

join us upstairs, away from the computers, where we'll be trying out multiple ways to solve problems, individually and communally. Let's see...
where we end up.

Looking forward--
Anne, Kim and Doug

In preparation for Kim's presentation this morning about multiple ways of problem-solving, we offered answers to one another's questions. Here's a record of some of what was said in response to

• Mitch's question: What new ideas have I gotten that are more useful than my present assumptions?
  • Emergence
  • Edge of Chaos
• Paul's question: In what ways might the concept of evolution be useful (in class, elsewhere?)
  • Examining American history in terms of interactions among the 13 colonies. Looking at the history of Africa, Asia and South America at the same period as "clumpy diversity."
  • math probability
  • genetics: random selection
  • evolution of culture, langauge, music, clothing
  • computer technology-research
• Brian's question: How can I teach that simple past changes create new forms (ie. historical dependence)?
  • use a timeline with the following inserts: inventions, proofs, and research
• Regina's question: What do I do, when kids want to discuss things instead of doing the assigned task?
  • Most students are visual or tactile. You need to develop some activities that will keep their attention. Hands-on usually works. Also give the students a task.
  • Return to discussion at the end of objective (if it's not a teaching moment!)
  • disorder to order
• Marita's question: What other words/phrases might be used to make evolution more "palatable"?
  • generated change
  • emergence
  • pop culture: T.V. show "Survivors"
  • continuous research
  • growth
  • trends
  • measurement
  • culture
  • community
  • "This is a story, just a story."
• Randal's Question:Where does our obligation as teachers lie?
  • To teach to the best of our abilities, w/ 100% commitment, and to enable each child to reach their highest potential
  • facilitators
  • facilitate discussion
  • present the information
  • dispel rumors/opinions
  • encourage further discussion/investigation outside the classroom
  • openness
  • tolerance
• Marlene's question: How could causes of prejudice be a lesson in the connectedness of it all?
  • It may open up minds to "otherness"/differences and make people less "ignorant."
  • By looking at the causes of prejudice, we can examine the ways people are disconnected.
  • causes of prejudice-->opinions--> subjective
  • connectedness--> facts--> objective
  • reading skills--> recognizing propaganda techniques
• Peggy Hollyday's contribution, a July 20, 2003 Philadelphia Inquirer article on "New-yet-old ideas about the soul": "I share the Freudian notion of the soul as an emergent property. It's largely repressed, and it's a potential."
  • This is using soul as metaphor, not as "emergent" in the way we've been discussing, as arising from small, local, physical interactions.

Quite a FEW grains of sand in this growing pile!!
Thanks to all for your contributions--
Anne

Out of my archiving-mania
(has to do w/ being an English prof...or maybe, just aging and a fear of loss
[FEAR=False Evidence Appearing Real]

here's a record of what Kim taught us this morning:

She invited us to see "what's going on in kids' heads,
beginning w/ something "real we could touch and feel": the Cracker Barrel Peg Game.
We played it separately, several times.
Kim walked us through a successful strategy for "winning" the game,
then invited us to play it again--
but none of us were able to reproduce the strategy successfully.
This was a great example of what happens (so often) in our classrooms:
we TEACH them something, then get frustrated that they don't USE it instantly.

We're calling this the "strategy of inefficiency."

Drawing on Siegler's work about children's problem-solving strategies, Kim explained that

• kids use more than one strategy to solve the same problem
• those multiple strategies co-exist over long periods of time
• based on experience, kids will change their relative reliance on different strategies.

What motivates this change?

• experience, not direct instruction
• self reflection (both conscious and unconscious): observing which strategies work
• the more variable/erratic the behavior, the more chaotic "fooling around" students engage in, the more strategies they will have available to draw on
• new things are learned best not when a student's at an impasse, but when they are working at tasks that seem more manageable.

• give them experience
• help them get better at knowing which strategy works at which time
• help them get more efficient at recognizing what they know.

• At any given time: there is more competition than you would expect between various strategies.
• Does using the calculator limit the number of effective strategies available to students? (For instance: not knowing math facts means they can't draw on them to solve problems.)
• A useful analogy is a child, taken away from abusive parents, who takes some time (sometimes, several placements) to realize that it is better to be in a foster family. They prefer what they know, even if what they know is "not good."
• Siegler's work is not "contextual": it focuses on a child's conscious and unconscious preferences w/out considering what other things--besides the problem itself--determine waht he does.
• Cf. his theory to ants going around a log: like their "preference" for a shorter route, the more we do something, the more efficient we get at it, because an associative process builds up.
• Our reflections about this may be metacognitive; they may be an unconscious reflectiveness.

• talking out loud
• couldn't do it unconsciously: had to explain to our partner
• less individual exploration
• feedback
• encouragement to re-do: make each move "tentative"
• like "moon walking": ability to go backwards
• more possibilities brought to light
• permission to revise
• more background knowledge to draw on
• more memory to draw on.