Roy Pea's article, Practices of distributive intelligence and design for education, argues that tools, environments and activities in education should be designed in such a manner that they are useful in encouraging student learning. He explains that distributed intelligence is gained from the activities that one engages in day-to-day and have a social and material dimension. Intelligence can be inherent in designed artifacts such as measuring tape that indicates diameter instead of length, legos that are designed to only be connected in away which informs their use.
According to Pea, learning can be viewed as much more than "problem solving" and more broadly in terms of each of the desires. This can take the form of activities of play that create and find as much problems they "solve". Similarly, the design of new technologies can support human activities by serving as experimental platforms in the evolution of intelligence - by opening up new possibilities for distributed intelligence. Pea's research optimism constructs learners as inventors of distributed-intelligence-as-tool, rather than receivers of intelligence as substance- ready not only to adapt to change but to contribute substantially to it (p. 82.)
Technology should be designed to enhance the exchange of intelligence. By designing better devices or applications we have a greater impact on the sharing and creation of intelligence via our interactions with the technologies we have created. Pea argues that we cannot only emphasize the effects of working with technology because that is similar to emphasizing the effects of working with tools like pencils or measurement scales. If we are comfortable teaching students how to exploit those tools (pencils, measuring tapes etc.), then why the uneasiness with electronic tools?
The NMC and ELI 2010 Horizon Report is illustrative and supports Pea's article. The issues makes it clear that there are and there will be technologies designed to further our abilities in certain areas, such as accessibility to learning materials through the use of electronic books and other. These technologies can be seen as tools for distributing intelligence (gesture-based computing, visual analysis tools, augmented reality) or to aid in access to distributed intelligence (mobile computing, open content, electronic books). The overall impact of the Horizon Report is to inform and challenge us to strive for and investigate what technologies are available and how we can use them to enhance the learning experience for the individuals we educate.
In his book, Design for the Real World, designer and educator Victor Papanek (1985), exclaims that we are all designers and that designing is integral to all human activity because it is "the conscious effort to impose meaningful order." That meaningful order however is very much caught up in the tools, materials and the process that we use. As an example, he offers up the case of early Swedish settlers who when they began building in Delaware, "had at their disposal trees and axes. The material was a round tree trunk, the tool an axe, and the process a simple kerf cut into the log. The inevitable result of this combination of tools, materials, and process is a log cabin." This definition of design therefore further supports Roy Pea's view of distributive intelligence which emphasizes that educators should attempt to make use of their environment in designing learning and creating activities that promotes the acquisition of intelligence and therefore knowledge.
Both Pea and the Horizon Report have valuable points talking about utilization and integration of technology design in education. This is evident here at Penn State, where we have designed technologies that are enabling us to provide education to the global market. We can discuss any variety of subjects with students from around the world. This also speaks to Pea's discussion on how the technologies we design have the ability to transform the world in which we live. By interacting on a global level, we have new opportunities for understanding others, exchanging ideas, and enhancing our knowledge to better improve our environments. As human understanding of the world becomes more complex, we'll need more and more tools to off-load intelligence in order to deal with the complexity.
According to Pea, learning can be viewed as much more than "problem solving" and more broadly in terms of each of the desires. This can take the form of activities of play that create and find as much problems they "solve". Similarly, the design of new technologies can support human activities by serving as experimental platforms in the evolution of intelligence - by opening up new possibilities for distributed intelligence. Pea's research optimism constructs learners as inventors of distributed-intelligence-as-tool, rather than receivers of intelligence as substance- ready not only to adapt to change but to contribute substantially to it (p. 82.)
Technology should be designed to enhance the exchange of intelligence. By designing better devices or applications we have a greater impact on the sharing and creation of intelligence via our interactions with the technologies we have created. Pea argues that we cannot only emphasize the effects of working with technology because that is similar to emphasizing the effects of working with tools like pencils or measurement scales. If we are comfortable teaching students how to exploit those tools (pencils, measuring tapes etc.), then why the uneasiness with electronic tools?
The NMC and ELI 2010 Horizon Report is illustrative and supports Pea's article. The issues makes it clear that there are and there will be technologies designed to further our abilities in certain areas, such as accessibility to learning materials through the use of electronic books and other. These technologies can be seen as tools for distributing intelligence (gesture-based computing, visual analysis tools, augmented reality) or to aid in access to distributed intelligence (mobile computing, open content, electronic books). The overall impact of the Horizon Report is to inform and challenge us to strive for and investigate what technologies are available and how we can use them to enhance the learning experience for the individuals we educate.
In his book, Design for the Real World, designer and educator Victor Papanek (1985), exclaims that we are all designers and that designing is integral to all human activity because it is "the conscious effort to impose meaningful order." That meaningful order however is very much caught up in the tools, materials and the process that we use. As an example, he offers up the case of early Swedish settlers who when they began building in Delaware, "had at their disposal trees and axes. The material was a round tree trunk, the tool an axe, and the process a simple kerf cut into the log. The inevitable result of this combination of tools, materials, and process is a log cabin." This definition of design therefore further supports Roy Pea's view of distributive intelligence which emphasizes that educators should attempt to make use of their environment in designing learning and creating activities that promotes the acquisition of intelligence and therefore knowledge.
Both Pea and the Horizon Report have valuable points talking about utilization and integration of technology design in education. This is evident here at Penn State, where we have designed technologies that are enabling us to provide education to the global market. We can discuss any variety of subjects with students from around the world. This also speaks to Pea's discussion on how the technologies we design have the ability to transform the world in which we live. By interacting on a global level, we have new opportunities for understanding others, exchanging ideas, and enhancing our knowledge to better improve our environments. As human understanding of the world becomes more complex, we'll need more and more tools to off-load intelligence in order to deal with the complexity.
I agree that much of contemporary design, especially within technology, is based upon the idea that learners are "inventors of...intelligence...rather than receivers of intelligence," and that education should be at least as able to "create and find as much problems as [it solves]." Certainly the designs of Disruptive Technologies today assist learners to contribute globally to human knowledge by not only answering problems but asking questions. Specifically I think of open source software, or at least software which invites contributions and designs from non-employees. For example, Google invites users to try out their beta products (e.g., Wave) and contribute to brainstorming its possible uses. Thus, as Tutaleni points out, today's design developers seek "not only to adapt to change but to contribute substantially to it." And we get better results out of it.
I think a good design is that its function is usable and appealing to different people base on individual desires. Apply this to class or course design, a good design should be effective or functional for every learner, no matter in professional skills, commumnication skills, technological using or even respection and collaboration. As long as each one gets involved in the learning environment, participates in learning process, leanr from others and contribute one's own strength, all achievement can go toward the same goal, maybe a problem-soving solution or a big project, then it could be a good design.
Your response states: "Pea argues that we cannot only emphasize the effects of working with technology because that is similar to emphasizing the effects of working with tools like pencils or measurement scales. If we are comfortable teaching students how to exploit those tools (pencils, measuring tapes etc.), then why the uneasiness with electronic tools?" I think the answer to your question lies in the fact that many of us are not comfortable with electronic tools and, thus, are not comfortable teaching our students how to exploit them. I would argue that it is virtually impossible to teach someone to do/use something which you yourself are not completely familiar with. That is why, in my opinion, the use of current and emerging technologies should be an integral part of pre-service and in-service teacher education. If we are comfortable with the technologies then perhaps we will be comfortable teaching our students to take advantages of all of the affordances that they offer.
I'd like to take a chance at answering the question, "If we are comfortable teaching students how to exploit those tools (pencils, measuring tapes etc.), then why the uneasiness with electronic tools?" I think there are two possible answers to this question. First, many teachers, especially the ones who have been teaching for 20 years or more, are set in their ways in how they teach. Many of these teachers teach the same classes year after year and they use the same lecture notes over and over again and nothing changes! By introducing new technologies to them it would require them to change the ways they teach their students to accommodate the new use of the new technology. I feel if you ask teachers who have been teaching for many years to add new technology into their teaching scheme the train of excuses will be endless. The dominant excuse would most likely be "I've been teaching this way for 20 years, I've had no problems teaching this way before, why should I change?". Other teachers may say they don't want to change because they don't see themselves teaching much longer before they retire so they feel it would be a waste to learn the new technology.
The second answer to the above question is that I feel some teachers may be uneasy about the new technologies is because once a teacher learns about one new technology, they'll have to learn about them all. The rate at which technology is advancing today is exponential and I feel that some teachers may simply feel that they may become overwhelmed in trying to keep up with learning about the new technologies and thus ignore the notion of new technologies altogether.
I like the idea from the Pea article that"Technology should be designed to enhance the exchange of intelligence." Technology is a great tool and gives us the opportunity to do many things. This opportunity is not always used in the best way. All of the information that is available via the internet needs to be organized in a meaningful and efficient manner. Technology is a great way to make information accessible to all.
@Mark, your point about Open Source software is a very interesting one in light of Pea's ideas about distributed intelligence. He states that the designed objects in our environment shape how we apply our intelligence in various activities. One would presume that if the design of those objects were fixed, there would be a finite number of ways of using them. For instance, a hammer can only do so many things. Computer software can range from highly specialized and limited in functionality to flexible and open-ended. But if it's "closed source" we can't really adapt any of that functionality for our own evolving needs. We can't even really gain a full understanding of its capabilities in order to exploit them in ways the original developers perhaps didn't intend. On the other hand, open source software allows us (or sufficiently skilled individuals) to make modifications that could improve how we use that software to achieve some task. Imagine being able to take a mallet, notice you need to pull some nails you nailed into a board, and extent a fork off the back for that purpose, right on the spot. Hardware is obviously a little less mutable than software, although there's actually a growing community of "makers" or do-it-yourself hardware hackers (see http://makezine.com/ and http://www.makerfaire.com/). The idea of open source is certainly right in line with designing to distribute intelligence.
Is the classroom considered a "tool"? Technically I think it would be catagorized as a learning environment; and I think that most people would give that as their first answer. But doesn't the "design" of a classroom serve to promote or hinder learning? If a classroom can be set up in such a way so as to get the most engagement out of the students (such as the seating arrangement, or the technologies that are incorporated into the classroom), wouldn't that become a "tool" that encourages learning?
In regards to the "why uneasiness with electronic tools" question, I think there is a difference in how this question is approached if you are thinking of "effects _with_ technology" or "effects _of_ technology" (Salomon, et al. quoted by Pea, 75). In the "effects with" camp, one can argue that technology do or do not aid the learning of the material. In the "effects of" camp, what is to be learned cannot be separated from the technology involved. The unanswered question for the "effects of" people is whether or not the tools are prevalent enough and their use culturally accepted enough that they should be what is learned. Of course, once the tools get to that point, their contribution to intelligence will be "invisible" enough that few, if any, will argue against their use, no matter which camp they are in.
To respond to Dolly's question about whether a classroom can be viewed as a "tool", I would think that it can. If not the physical structure of the room itself, certainly the contents of the room (chairs, tables, other seating, technologies) are tools. And with those tools come the affordances that the tools provide... chairs around a circular table may invite more discussion than rows of desks. Pea's article talks of door handles that effectively tell a user to push or pull... the elements of a classroom can certainly "tell" students to discuss or collaborate, or to sit still and not interact with the other students in the room.
I also like Pea's claim which considers learners as inventors of distributed-intelligence-as-tool, rather than receivers of intelligence as substance. I think that's the reason why the way of teaching should be changed with the development of technology. Wikipedia, for instance, would be one of the examples which explains Pea's claim above. For traditional classrooms (at least in Asia), most classes were teacher-centered so what students need to do was just sit in there and pay attention to the lecture. However, with the use of technological tools such as Wikipedia, anyone can contribute to it having authorities.
If teachers can apply this kind of tools to class, both teachers and students will have to put more effort to get to know it and to feel comfortable with it but I think it's worth it.
I like the idea in this posting about sharing exchanging creating intelligence with the technologies we designed in one environment. Both Pea's article and "Medium is message" claimed that technology does not only make jobs easier but to change a way we interact with the world. With the ability to discover exchange create intelligence with the tools, learners are not longer passive receivers. I assume this is part of the reasons that ways of our interaction to the world are reshaped.
I think what Yunjeong pointed out in her last post about how the traditional classrooms, being teacher-centered, focus on students receiving intelligence as substance is an important argument for why social networking platforms can be beneficial in classrooms. Just as progressive education has shifted focus from the teacher-centered pedagogies to the fact that students can be creators and designers of knowledge, the internet has transformed from a place where formally people mostly consumed information to a place where individual create and interact with information that THEY have control over. Platforms like facebook, youtube, and ning are examples of internet tools that allow for the widespread creation and dispersement of information. How can we harness the potential of these things more efficiently in educational settings?
I think a good design is that its function is usable and appealing to different people base on individual desires. Apply this to class or course design, a good design should be effective or functional for every learner, no matter in professional skills, commumnication skills, technological using or even respection and collaboration. As long as each one gets involved in the learning environment, participates in learning process, leanr from others and contribute one's own strength, all achievement can go toward the same goal, maybe a problem-soving solution or a big project, then it could be a good design.
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