Pedagogy has been used in this chapter to include all aspects of the ways in which teachers create learning environments in the classroom through an appropriate alignment of instructional strategies and styles of the teacher and the Learning Object. As such pedagogical concerns include all the choices that affect how the students can manipulate the learning materials to construct and reconstruct their conceptions in the classroom. In this manner it will include the social aspects of the learning purpose as conceived by the teacher and the students, and the way in which the resource either facilitates or hinders that purpose. While the social construction of learning is at the heart of the pedagogy, it cannot be seen in isolation. Also important is the manner in which the learning context is developed and directed. The context is the environment in which learning occurs and a learning environment is created around the resource by the programming of the teacher and the reactions of the students. The pedagogy will also include a component where the physical and cognitive skills of the students are recognised by the way that the teacher and the resource draw on them to facilitate the learning outcome.
Published in Chapter:
Effective Use of Learning Objects in Class Environments
David Lake (James Cook University, Australia), Kate Lowe (Murdoch University, Australia), Rob Phillips (Murdoch University, Australia), Rick Cummings (Murdoch University, Australia), and Renato Schibeci (Murdoch University, Australia)
Copyright: © 2009
|Pages: 22
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-59904-861-1.ch024
Abstract
This chapter provides a model to analyse the effectiveness and efficiency of Learning Objects being used in primary and secondary schools by considering their place within that educational environment, paying particular attention to the manner in which they, like any resource, can aid or occlude productive interactions between teachers and students. It draws from a study of Australian and New Zealand schools that piloted the first release of Learning Objects from the Le@rning Federation. The chapter considers the place of Learning Objects within the overall systemic school environment, and in this environment, examines the individual classroom as the combination of tensions between the teacher’s needs, the students’ needs, and the potential available within the existing infrastructure. Within this framework, the chapter discusses the ways in which these three components interact during teacher selection of Learning Objects, students’ accession of Learning Objects in the classroom, and the use of the Learning Objects by students. It concludes by suggesting how students’ construction of knowledge can be enhanced through merging the capabilities of the resource with the needs of students and teachers.