The Models of Engaged Learning and Teaching: Connecting Sophisticated Thinking from Early Childhood to PhD (SpringerBriefs in Education)

This book provides a practical philosophy for promoting students' sophisticated thinking from Early Childhood to PhD in ways that explicitly interconnect across the years of education. It will help teachers, academics and the broader learning and teaching community to understand and implement these connections by introducing a conceptual framework, the Models of Engaged Learning and Teaching (MELT). By covering the nature, philosophy, practice and implications of MELT for teachers and students alike, the book will help teachers to facilitate students’ awareness of, and increasing responsibility for, the thinking demanded by subject and discipline-specific learning as well as interdisciplinary learning, whether face to face, online or in blended modes. The book will also provide educators with ways to effectively engage with complex, and sometimes conflicting, contemporary educational concepts, and with a diverse variety of colleagues involved in the learning and teaching enterprise. The book provides guidance that allows curriculum improvement, teacher action research and larger-scale research to be reported on from a common perspective, bridging the gap between those readers focused on research and those focused on teaching. The book shares valuable insights and ways of addressing the contemporary issue of discipline-based learning versus transdisciplinary learning, reducing the dichotomy and enabling the two approaches to complement each other. This is an Open Access book. Preface Place Value Acknowledgements Contents Acronyms 1 What Is Our Purpose? 1.1 Purpose 1.2 MELT Components 1.2.1 MELT Facets 1.2.2 Continuum of Learning Autonomy 1.2.3 MELT as a Thinking Routine 1.3 Parachute 1.3.1 MELT Features in Parachute 1.4 100 Billion Brains: Learning from Human Prehistory to Contemporary Classrooms and Learning Environments 1.4.1 Beaver and Human Know-How 1.4.2 Inevitable Earth: Problems with Dams 1.5 One Billion Brains More: The Problems We Face Need Research-Mindedness 1.6 Structure of This Book 1.7 Conclusion: Student Learning that Resonates References 2 What Will We Use? 2.1 Introducing the Models of Engaged Learning and Teaching 2.1.1 A Holistic View 2.1.2 The Origins of the MELT 2.1.3 Learning Autonomy 2.2 Silver Fluoride 2.3 Student Experiences of MELT Facets and Autonomy 2.3.1 Embark & Clarify 2.3.2 Find & Generate 2.3.3 Evaluate & Reflect 2.3.4 Organise & Manage 2.3.5 Analyse & Synthesise 2.3.6 Communicate & Apply 2.3.7 Spiralling, Recursive and Messy 2.4 Conclusion: Engagement, Adaptability, Fluidity and Ownership References 3 How Do We Arrange? 3.1 MELT Connecting 3.2 Many Models Across Educational Levels and Contexts 3.2.1 Early Childhood 3.2.2 Year 4/5 Primary 3.2.3 Year 6 Primary School 3.2.4 Year 8 Subject-Specific: A Case Study 3.2.5 Year 7–10 High School Transdisciplinary Projects 3.2.6 Technical Education 3.2.7 Undergraduate 3.2.8 Work Integrated Learning 3.2.9 Course-Based Master’s Degree Programmes 3.2.10 Academic Research: Doctoral, Master’s and Early Career Research (ECR) 3.2.11 Interdisciplinary Studies and Digital Literacy 3.3 Outside the MELT Parameters 3.4 Conclusion: Commonality with Adaptability References 4 What Do We Trust? 4.1 Gullible Consumers or Discerning Users? 4.2 Shrink 4.3 MELT Analysis of Shrink 4.3.1 What Did Tara Trust? 4.4 Three Theoretical Orientations to Learning: Objectivism, Social Constructivism and Personal Constructivism 4.5 Understanding the Three Theories Using the Example of Shrink 4.5.1 Objectivist Perspective on Shrink 4.5.2 Personal Constructivist perspective on Shrink 4.5.3 Social Constructivism on Shrink 4.5.4 All Three 4.6 Theoretical Underpinning of MELT 4.6.1 Theory on Learner and Teacher Autonomy 4.6.2 Autonomy and Metaphor Together 4.7 Trusting the MELT? 4.8 Conclusion: Conversations and Arguments References 5 What Does It Mean? 5.1 Situating Contemporary Learning Theories/Ideas 5.1.1 Threshold Concepts [2] 5.1.2 Cognitive Load Theory [3] 5.1.3 Connectivism [4] 5.1.4 Schön’s Reflective Practitioner [5] 5.1.5 Corporately Destructive or Mutually Informative? 5.2 MELT for Curriculum Design and Improvement 5.2.1 Teacher Action Research 5.2.2 Conjoined Action Research: From the Transferability of Individual Studies to Generalisability When Using an a Priori Framework 5.3 Conclusion: Multifaceted Use with the Same Overarching Purpose References 6 How Do We Relate? 6.1 Soyuz and Apollo: A Story About a Cold War Meeting in Orbit 6.2 Inevitable Earth 6.3 Evitable Earth 6.4 Retheorising Theory in Education, from ‘Competition’ to ‘Complement’ 6.5 Conclusion: It’s Only When We Relate to Divergent Practices, Concepts and Places in Education that We Will Solve Our Educational Problems References 7 How Much Guidance? 7.1 Autonomy: Engaged Learning, Engaged Teaching 7.2 Conclusion: Structure Provided, Creativity Needed References Glossary of MELT Terms Index