Chapter 5 Review

Learning Log 4

            The Reflective Phase of PAR is important because it enables students to think more in depth about the things they have learned, helps retain the material they've read, provides demonstration of one's learning through processes of informational evaluation (page 109), and lastly, helps students become autonomous learners. Students can become autonomous learners by comprehension monitoring, or keeping track on one's own thoughts and learning by pausing, analyzing, recalling and retelling information. Forms of reflection in a nutshell involve, discussion, debate, lab application, writing, reorganizing, rehearsal, and activities where students use schemata to process ideas and contemplate complex interactions (page 109).

            Three important skills to emphasize during the Reflective Phase of PAR :

            1. Communication- listening and speaking reflectively about reading reinforces learning in a social context

            2. Critical Thinking- this involves inductive skills like hypothesis testing, proposition creation and creative argument which help to form more complex and interrelated schema. Teachers have a hard time providing situations that reinforce critical thinking skills (page 112) but one easy way is to create activities that engage in problem solving. The chapter outlines the steps needed to design a good problem solving lesson plan: gather ideas and information, define the problem, form tentative conclusions, test these conclusions, and make a final decision while giving reasons for choices.

            I really like activity the book presented on page 113, Activity 5.1: Critical Thinking Guide: Problem Solving. Not only is this applicable for a lot of different types of content areas, but I think it's a really useful life guide. Students should get acquainted with its design and apply it to everyday life choices. I could've used this critical thinking plan during times in my life.

            3. Critical Literacy- aka, "reading between the lines" (page 115). This skill helps students critically examine the text and consider the author's motivation for writing the material. I believe this skill develops over time. I only say this because I don't recall being very adept at critical literacy until I was in my high school years.

            I am very biased against the very lengthy section on cooperative learning. I think that importance of this type of learning is over hyped. I have not experienced increased learning very often through this method. I guess this just goes to show you that not everyone learns the same way. I often found myself either taking charge of other people's work (who were freeloading) or being swayed by the loudest group member into doing what they wanted. I know this sounds horrible but I also struggled to feel confident in the work some of my group members submitted. They only time I have benefited from cooperative learning activities was when I was taking science lab classes (for science majors only), which I found very difficult. I really hope my groups didn't think I was free loading, but I was often very lost during lab exercises so being able to rely on stronger, more able group members helped me understand the material. Another way I see this type of learning being effective is when each member has a very time consuming, in-depth task. If each member works diligently at their task, and shares the results with the group, this can be an extremely efficient lesson for everyone. But other than the things I have mentioned, I do not think cooperative learning should get the praise it does. Please let me know what you, the reader, think about this. What kind of experiences have you had with this type of learning?