Do You See What I See? Probably Not!

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Presented via OpenPathEducation.com: Let’s discuss how what we see (and hear, taste, feel) in the world might not be the same for everyone else. Topics include face blindness, aphantasia, synesthesia – including misophonia and mirror-touch (empathy) – and sensory processing sensitivity.

Are you a highly sensitive person? Are autism, ADHD, and being HSP the same thing? How might having sensory processing sensitivity traits impact your parenting style? Also learn about the self/other theory and how this might influence your perspectives and choices.

Open Path is a heartfelt project of mine and my family’s. The “education” focus includes a resource for parents wanting to homeschool to meet their child’s unique needs and interests. We can also provide professional development for teachers and anyone else wanting to learn the “Open Path approach.”

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Homeschool Quickstart

 

Cass and I shared information about starting homeschooling. It’s a lengthy video, full of information that many people don’t think about. Having this information up front can help people avoid some common mistakes. It pulled information from the Homeschool Quickstart course; the course provides more information, and more depth, but we still managed to pack in a lot of information.

Topics:

  • Clarifying your goals
  • Setting up a learning environment that works for your child(ren)
  • Scheduling and energy management
  • Creating lessons and classes
  • Understanding learning needs and preferences
  • Socialization and the “real world”
  • Motivation – including procrastination and academic integrity
  • Assessment and feedback (including options for “grades”)
  • Curriculum and learning resources
  • Using public schools, online schools, and colleges as part of your program – and important considerations!
  • Questions to ask when evaluating online schools to avoid misinformation and disappointment
  • AP, Honors, and Dual Enrollment
  • College-bound homeschooled students

 

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Self-Efficacy & Personal Agency: Move from Conformity to Empowerment

Ever hear about a student who can pay attention and have follow-through for projects of interest, but then fail to turn in the simplest homework assignment? What is said about this student? Not working to potential? Lacking consistent self-efficacy?

Does this sound like anybody you know?

Your self-efficacy is how effective you think you are in being able to accomplish a particular task or meet a goal. Educators often lament about low student self-efficacy and ask how to help students take personal responsibility for their own learning.

The problem is in the framing of the question. The unspoken part. The part about the expectation being that each of us should be effective at cramming ourselves into pre-defined boxes, conforming to expectations that might have nothing to do with our needs, desires, or even career goals.

Think back to that student scenario. Perhaps not doing homework, and instead spending time engaged in other, meaningful tasks is exactly how some students “take personal responsibility for their own learning.”  The students following the scripted program are seen as having high levels of self-efficacy. They are very effective at conforming.

Now, to be fair, if the script matches your needs, interests, and goals, then by all means, carry on. To personalize learning means to do so for all students, including those who would work well with a more traditional approach. We do not want to discriminate against one one set of students in our efforts to meet the needs of all the others.

However, how do we know? How do we know if the box that has become comfortable is the “right” one for us, or the right one for a student we are serving? The answer: don’t stop at self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is a means to something more. It is a strategy that can be used to successfully conform, but it can also be used toward higher level goals: empowerment, and – ultimately – personal agency. How can we get students in the driver seat in their education and, more importantly, their life? We need to remember that the goal is for students to each have a voice and a choice in all things pertaining to their selves and their own lives.

When mentoring teachers, I remind them that it’s not about us. It’s about them, the students. Don’t tell them what to think, but teach them to think – critically – and that means questioning everything. After all, what happens when you change your mind? Are you going to send all of your former students an update? Perhaps you can create a smart phone app for that? Of course not. Also, their world might not be your world; they need to be life-long learners who have been empowered to have full personal agency in their own lives – from their own bodies to their career choices.

Is it really that simple? Yes and no. Yes, the attitude as described above is really just that. However, the implementation can be challenging at times. It can take time to detox a student from previous experiences and social programming, and you can expect some flailing about or at least looks of suspicion when offering the driver seat to a student. That student might not even have a sense of direction, answering with “dunno” when asked what they want, and it can take awhile to discover and tap into something meaningful. Even if they get in the driver seat, they might not go anywhere at first. They need guidance; it is a process that is as self-paced as all other things the students might learn.

But know this: it can be done. It has been done. And we continue to do it. It’s an important part of preparing students for a future we cannot fully imagine, and it’s our best hope for that future being a good one.

Photo by Aaron Burden

 

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Are Learning Styles Dead?

Should we be concerned with recent articles saying that there is no evidence of learning gains by teaching only to that student’s primary learning style?

Being open to new research is part of how we remain cutting-edge in our field. However, we need to be careful in how we analyze and make use of that research.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. If a researcher does not find evidence of something existing, it typically means one of two things: 1) that thing doesn’t exist, or 2) the thing does exist, but the researcher did not conduct a study in a way to find evidence for it.

Taking one aspect of one category of learning styles, and trying to teach a student through only that one aspect, is not likely to result in optimal learning for that student.That’s like throwing flour in a bowl and complaining that it’s not a cake.

For example, one category of learning styles is perceptual modalities. Of the six or more modalities, one is auditory-listening. Having a student only learn through listening, and no other means, will not likely yield the best results. Usually students need to learn through multiple means. There have been studies that showed evidence that students initially learning through primary learning styles, and then following up with secondary and tertiary preferred learning styles, did have stronger learning gains.

However, learning styles include more than perceptual modalities. Other categories include environmental, social, psychological, neurotype considerations, conditional-situational, and more. Learning styles inventories – or typologies – vary in how many categories they include.

Every typology is limited to what that typology measures or inventories. For example, a super simple modality inventory might only have three options: visual, auditory, and hands-on. A slightly more complex modality inventory will recognize the difference between visual-text and visual-picture, or between auditory-listening and auditory-verbal, and so on. An even more sophisticated inventory will begin to account for the possibility of synesthesia and other perceptual input considerations. And that’s just modalities.

Some typologies include modalities plus several other categories. For every single category, the typology is only measuring for the possibilities that it predicts to exist. Each person is more complex than what even the most complete typology can show.

However, it’s a start. It’s a conversation-starter. A learning styles or similar assessment can facilitate the beginning of self-awareness, hopefully provide some affirmation, and serve as a catalyst to communicate needs and preferences. Communication is important for learning, and word choice is important for communication.

The phrase “learning styles” has been defined and applied in a variety of ways, making communication and research about learning styles problematic at best.

Learning needs and preferences is better terminology than learning styles. Most can agree that a student who is blind is not likely to learn from visual means, and that a person who is Deaf will not likely learn through auditory means. They have learning needs that seem obvious, wouldn’t you agree? Where do we draw the line though? How about a student with a processing disorder confirmed with fMRI scans; would this be accepted evidence of a learning need?

At what point do we draw the line between a need and what we would instead define as a preference? And should we?

There’s value having students experience learning in a variety of ways, and even growing skills and strategies for different approaches and scenarios. Active reading strategies help with processing text. Note-taking practice can help process auditory information, and using technology such as recording and speech to text can also be a great tool to discover. Learning how to work independently is important. Learning how to work with others, or even to oversee a group in a project management capacity, can develop valuable skills. Some students will be more capable of using certain learning approaches than others, both due to learning needs and preferences.

Why would preferences matter?

What it comes down to is this: emotions matter. If you get a student who needs to be detoxed from previous experiences, or who is coming to you from trauma, or who simply has a poor self-image as a learner, having that student begin the learning process in ways most comfortable and manageable could be vital for that student to move toward a growth mindset. Some students don’t have bootstraps; and if they did, what happens when you try to lift yourself up by your own bootstraps? You fall. That’s the original meaning of this phrase.

Emotions impact motivation, as well as the ability to learn in the moment no matter how motivated. Affirmation, being seen or validated, and gaining a sense of self-awareness can lead to an empowered learner. A sense that success is possible – an increasing internal locus of control – and that one’s own unique strengths and traits are valuable, makes it easier to try. Starting with preferred ways of learning, experiencing success, and building upon that foundation, can put the student in the position to stretch and try new things later. It’s one part of a complete recipe for success.

Your Experience?

Ever struggle to learn something until you tried it a different way? Or did you ever experience anxiety or other stress with a particular class, or even a subject area? What happened?

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