Individualized Learning with Technology: Meeting the Needs of High School Students

233 Pages·2013·0.9 MB·English

by  Chris Bernat, Richard J. Mueller

INDIVIDUALIZED LEARNING
WITH TECHNOLOGY
Meeting the Needs of
High School Students
Chris Bernat and
Richard J. Mueller
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD EDUCATION
A division of
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD
Lanham • Boulder • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK
PublishedbyRowman&LittlefieldEducation
AdivisionofRowman&Littlefield
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Copyright©2014byChrisBernatandRichardJ.Mueller
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereproducedinanyformorby
anyelectronicormechanicalmeans,includinginformationstorageandretriev-
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whomayquotepassagesinareview.
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ISBN978-1-4758-0585-7(cloth:alk.paper)—ISBN978-1-4758-0586-4(pbk.:alk.paper)—ISBN
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CONTENTS
Preface v
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction ix
1 Needed:ARevolutioninLearning 1
2 TheEducationalTechnologySolution 15
3 AnIndividualizedPlanBasedonTypesofMemory 27
4 ImprovingLearning:“LowerBrain” 47
5 ImprovingLearning:“HigherBrain” 63
6 EnhancingAttentionandPerception 79
7 PromotingBetterMemoryandAssessment 93
8 EnhancingKnowledgeFormation 111
9 ProvidingforExperience—It’stheBestTeacher 127
10 CognitiveandTechnologicalSkill-Building 145
11 ApplicationsforCognitiveandTechnologicalSkill-Building 161
12 IndividualizingInstruction 175
13 ApplicationsforIndividualizedInstruction 191
Notes 205
AbouttheAuthors 219
iii

PREFACE
T
his book is the result of a collaborative effort between my father’s
writingandmyown.Aftermyfather,RichardJ.Mueller,retiredfroma
thirty-year career as a professor of educational psychology in the mid-
1990s,hedecidedtowriteatextbook.Histextbookwouldcontainallof
the typical educational psychology material, but he wanted to add two
additional chapters. These new chapters would outline two emerging
trends that he felt would have a monumental impact on the field of
education.
The twonewtrendswere theriseofthecomputer for use in educa-
tional settings and the rise of the adult learner, who would increasingly
require learning throughout life. My father believed that these two
powerful trends would exert a strong pressure to change many of the
fundamental processes of public education. Increasingly, they would
push the learning subjects beyond the three Rs, they would demand
alternatives to the pedagogies of classroom instruction, and they would
require new assessments beyond the group-ranking of standardized
tests.
In the decade that followed the writing of my father’s textbook,
there did seem to arise a real need to fundamentally change and im-
prove formal education. Increasingly, education in the United States
wasbeingperceivedasinadequate.Itwasnolongermeetingthelearn-
ing needs of a complex, technological, and global society. And other
countrieswere passing theUnited Statesin achievement, implyingthat
v
vi PREFACE
our educational system was losing ground. But was it really losing
ground,orwasitreallythatothercountrieswerejust“catchingup”?
Like a nuclear-arms buildup, each country is now trying to out-
study, out-score, and out-disseminate the shear amount of knowledge
thatgoesintoeachstudent’shead.Butwhatistheultimateresultofthis
growing arms-like education race? It is that students are being filled
with an ever-increasing amount of simple facts and skills that they will
neveruseintherealworld.Andmostimportantly,studentsseemtobe
increasingly un-engaged and un-motivated in their studies the more
they are exposed to these heightened “standardized” methods of
achievementandtesting.
Even some of the highest performing countries like China confess
that they would like their education systems to produce more “Bill
Gates” types: students with the drive and ability to obtain the precise
knowledge and skills needed in order to create something new and
revolutionaryforthecountry.
Myfatherfinishedhistextbook,butitwasneverpublished.Notlong
after he completed his book, he developed cancer and died shortly
afterwards. But I took interest in his book. I had been working as an
instructionaldesignerandtechnicalwriterwithinbusinessandindustry
for over fifteen years. I was beginning to witness the real-world de-
mandsofthetrendsmyfatherhadspeculatedoninhistextbook.With-
in the business world, computers were being used more often as a tool
for specialized training, and adult learners were continually needing
morelearningtoimprovetheirskillsand“keepup.”
This is why I decided to collaborate on the writing of this book. I
wanted to contribute my knowledge of designing adult learning in the
workplacetotheareaofsecondaryeducation.Ifeltthathowwedesign
training in the workplace, in an individualized format and according to
each learner’s specific needs and goals, could provide for a new way to
improve education at the high school level. It is also hoped that this
framework can provide a blueprint for how educational software can
begin to be produced, collected, and organized according to this for-
mat—because of the very large array of applications out there—and
begintotargettheresultsthatareneeded.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I
want to thank my family for their support during the writing of this
book. My husband, Tom, has been really understanding. My son and
daughterhave alsobeen patient whenI was on thecomputer writing. I
greatly hope that this book will have an impact on their future educa-
tion.
Lastly, I’d like to dedicate this book to my father for his tireless
efforts to research ways to improve education. A phrase he was fond of
sayingasIwasgrowingupwas:“MotivationisIntelligence!”
vii