What the student does
The work of John Biggs is oft-cited, and his 1999 article What the Student Does: teaching for enhanced learning is a suggested text in the PG Cert.
The article begins by comparing two hypothetical students who each have a different motivation: the first has a ‘deep’ approach to learning, as she possesses a clear academic agenda and, through reflection, constructs significance to her learning, whilst the second student has a ‘surface’ approach and doesn’t invest in constructing significance but merely wishes to accumulate sufficient data to pass his course (pp. 57-8). Biggs states “the challenge we face as teachers” as getting the second student to learn in the way of the first.
Reading on, I came to this declaration:
As we learn, our conceptions of phenomena change, and we see the world differently. The acquisition of information in itself does not bring about such a change, but the way we structure that information and think what it does. Thus, education is about conceptual change, not just the acquisition of information.
(p. 60)
What came to mind at this point is what our tutors have said very recently, that the next Unit will change us as people – this is far more than amassing knowledge, but through being more informed and reflecting upon the significance of fresh data, we are open to shifting our attitudes to the world and our responses to it.
The Case Studies have enabled me to explore issues faced by my students and begin exploring strategies to aid them. However, there is a place for putting oneself at the centre and asking what this means for me first. And if we do this right, our students will reap benefits also.
Having gone off on an unexpected tangent, let’s return to Biggs. He describes three levels of teaching, which can be seen as parallels of the stages of a teacher advancing in their practice. The higher level sees the teacher concerned with “what the student does” (p. 63), which places student activity at the centre. This is achieved through first establishing objectives which define
- what we should be teaching,
- how we should be teaching it, and
- how we can assess how well students have learnt it (p. 64).
The use of verbs to define objectives is something I am familiar with, but guilty of being lax in applying them thoughtfully; so Biggs provides a welcome reminder, and interestingly he talks of there being “high level verbs such as theorise, reflect, generate, apply”, which can describe the approach of the ‘deep’ hypothetical student, and “lower level verbs such as recognise, memorise, and so on” that describe our ‘surface’ student (p. 64). I wouldn’t want to say that the lower level verbs should be avoided – they could provide an important stage in the process of understanding – but we need to be moving our students on to the higher functions.
Biggs continues to elaborate on this, never losing sight of the objectives expressed as verbs. What I am challenged to do is enlarge my lexical range of verbal objectives, and apply them thoughtfully in curriculum and lesson design. Here are some more to get started with (p. 65):
(lower) elaborate – classify – explain – solve – analyse – compare – hypothesise (higher)
540 words
References
Biggs, J. (1999) ‘What the Student Does: teaching for enhanced learning’, Higher Education Research & Development, vol. 18, issue 1, pp. 57-75. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0729436990180105 (Accessed 13 March 2024).