[Susan Manning] Okay...well how do you do how do you in the traditional classroom?
[Quad Cities] Unintelligible
[Susan Manning] Okay and so the way that you set up the question to will get them there...alright
[audience member] Unintelligible
[Susan Manning] Right...they might use different tools
to communicate that...okay can you see this image?
Alright finish this sentence
curiousity killed the cat not the dog
dogs give up if it's to hard
a dog will find something else to do
so that's why the dog is here
we tend to like we like being curious
and curiousity drives our students
but it has to be just enough curiousity
not to much the problem has to be
just difficult enough not to hard
if it's to hard if it's to complex
if you throw too much at people they turn off
their not cats
and we like to solve problems
that we think we can solve
that we have some sense that we can accomplish this
and I'm going to bring this back later on
in a different model but again that idea that students
need this in smaller doses
so that they feel that they can be successful
they have a little bit of curiousity
and we build on that
too much and you wipe them out
Background knowledge who are these guys
they look like pilots do you see
all those buttons
do you think they learned
all those buttons at once?
Do you think they started out
in a plane like this?
Do you know anything about flying?
And how you learn to fly?
You first have to start in a classroom
and you have to learn basic concepts
and vocabulary and then you get in a plane with
the instructor and you begin to learn
the instrument panel
the instrument panel on the plane
that you learn on is nothing like this
because it's much smaller plane
their only permitted to fly like under the clouds
or only so high at first
to were you don't need certain kinds
of instrumentation and then as you get so many
hours you move up in terms of the level
of sophistication with the airplane.
The same thing applies to how we sequence
our courses right you get some fundamental
background knowledge before you can move forward.
This is why my dad retains alot
of what he learned was because his instructor's
didn't let him go on until they were confident
that he had the background knowledge
and right or wrong for how we've structured
higher education it's often possible
for students to move on in their schooling
without really getting the fundamentals right okay
So the challenge then is to think
what kind of background knowledge
do students need first of all to get into
you're course and then what kind of background
knowledge are they going to need from you're course
to get to the next level?
That should help us define what it is
that were going to teach
and if you're teaching something
that doesn't fall in that range why bother.
it would be better to focus on the background
knowledge that there going to need.
Okay here's a model of thinking
and this is pure cognitive science
you get information from the environment
new information stuff that I'm telling you
right now and it goes and it interacts
with what you already know in you're long term memory
and it get's played with in what we call
you're working memory and the process
of thinking is the combining
of this long term memory
and what you are learning or experiencing
for the first time it get's into the working memory
you work it enough that eventually
it get's into it goes back into
the long term memory
okay..very, very simple model of how people think
Now the problem is that working knowledge
can only hold so much
it's limited in it's capacity
how long are telephone numbers?
Seven or ten digits right how long is a zip code?
Five digits and now we have the extra four
which I can not remember my extra four
that's because it's around seven things
that we can hold in our working memory
at one time some of us can hold a little more
some days it's a little less right
okay it has to be exercised
if this working memory is not exercised
it does atrophy and when it comes to holding
those things experts see different patterns
how many of you are musicians?
Okay I'm a musician also I play the flute
and my oldest daughter did three years
on the flute and then just in April
she switched to the oboe
so I was like wow well then I can't teach you
I'll have to start paying somebody else to do this
so she's now taking private lessons
with my friend Lou
and she hates it because she doesn't like going
every week and being exercised
Well Lou is working her in a series
that has a lot of chromatic
and she's working on triades right now
and he has her work on the, the fingering stuff
and then she applies this in a piece
it's a pretty well coordinated series that she's in
and she's turning a corner and she's beginning
to recognize patterns musically
so that she's becoming a much better sight reader
she'll pick up a piece of music and play it
because she kind of knows
what that chromatic is suppose to sound like
in that piece of music and it's really exciting
to see this I've said to her
Anna your becoming an expert
because now your recognizing
patterns that you couldn't see two years ago
two years ago you would seen -unintelligible-
and know you know what and you're fingers
know what to do
and so experts see things differently
than young learners or new learners
new lerners is a better way to say it
and so part of what we have to do is share
that thinking process and those patterns
so but they first have to have
that background information to build on that
Okay, -unintelligible- doing
no he's like this yeah
he's pulling his thoughts together.
Question 5 is the total amount of mental activity
imposed on working memory at one time
one instance of time what is that
I have one correct answer you want to quess?
Yeah the cognitive load is how hard
you're brain has to work
at one time
how do you think this relates
to teaching and learning?
Perfect answer how you need to chunk
it into smaller pieces because if you're load is to great
remember that curiosity puppy
the puppy is going to run away
because the puppy is going to get squished
Alright and here's an example
solve this in you're head
the answer is?
83 that was pretty easy
because it really didn't tax it wasn't a big cognitive load
right cause remember I said that working memory
is limited now do this one
see you're non-verbal said
I can't hold all of that in my head
that's to many it's to much
the cognitive load now is much higher
now some of you are going to be able
to do this in you're head but most of us
are going to have the reaction of shutting down
because there's to much our working memory
can not hold all of that information
were not that curious
I mean my God and I don't have enough
background knowledge know ones shown
me how to work these and hold these in my head
okay so that's my demonstration
to bring all of it together so far
This is a great quote
from The Why Students Don't Like School
"Memory is the residue of thought."