A Thinking Journey Based on Constructivism and Mediated Learning Experience as a Vehicle for Teaching Science to Low Functioning Students and Enhancing Their Cognitive Skills

Schur, Yaron; Skuy, Mervyn; Fridjhonb, Peter; Zietsman, Aletta

doi:10.1177/0143034302023001730

Cited by 13 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Programs that have provided specific training in mediation have been successful in leading to increases in the use of mediation by teachers (Greenberg et al, 1994;Tzuriel et al, 1998), as well as increases in parents' quality of mediational interaction with their children (Klein, 1991(Klein, , 2000Green, 1996). Improvement in mediation skill has correspondingly been found to translate into learning gains for children (Feuerstein et al, 1986;Tzuriel & Caspi, 1992;Ryder, 1995;Alvarez-Ortiz, 1997;Tzuriel et al, 1998;Schur et al, 2002;Skuy et al, 2002). The skills learned through early exposure to mediation may be of great importance to children as they approach school age, helping them to become more self-confident, emotionally mature and avid learners.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Applied assessment and intervention programs have been and continue to be developed based on Feuerstein's concept of the Mediated Learning Experience, for use with regular and special populations ranging from early childhood through adulthood (e.g., Feuerstein et al, 1986;Tzuriel & Caspi, 1992;Martin, 1993;Ryder, 1995;Birnbaum & Deutsch, 1996;Kozulin & Garb, 2002;Schur et al, 2002;Skuy et al, 2002;Tzuriel & Shamir, 2002). Although the primary focus of interventions using the Mediated Learning Experience has been the enhancement of cognitive potential, Pnina Klein's (1991Klein's ( , 2000 extensive research with young children and their parents has demonstrated the importance of the affective as well as the cognitive components of a mediational interaction Klein (1996) developed the Mediational Intervention for Sensitizing Caregivers, a program designed to improve mothers' mediation to their children.…”

Section: Caregiver Mediation In Child Care 241mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Caregivers' mediation and toddlers' emotional responses in the child care context

Frank

Stolarski

Scher

2006

Early Child Development and Care

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The purpose of this study was to explore the quality of daycare by examining interactions between caregivers and young children. Across 49 Israeli daycare centers, 299 children aged 18-30 months were observed naturalistically in groups of four to eight, together with their main caregiver. Caregivers' behavior was defined in terms of mediation and was assessed using the Mediated Learning Experience Scale developed by Lidz. Mediated learning, a concept developed by Feuerstein, is a reciprocal process wherein an attentive adult sensitively uses didactic skills to mediate between a child and the world. It was hypothesized that caregivers' mediation behavior would be linked to children's affective responses. No correlation was found between mediation behavior and children's positive approaches to the caregiver. There was a tendency toward more crying episodes in daycare centers in which the caregiver mediated less. Two mediation subscales were created, one emphasizing cognitive elements of mediation and the other emotional elements. Episodes of crying were found to be significantly fewer in daycare centers in which caregivers' cognitive mediation skills were higher. Children were found to initiate fewer approaches to their main caregiver when other caregivers were present. A tendency was also found toward fewer approaches the larger the group size of the children, supporting previous findings on the importance of group size for quality of daycare.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Caregiver Mediation In Child Care 241mentioning

confidence: 99%

Caregivers' mediation and toddlers' emotional responses in the child care context

Frank

Stolarski

Scher

2006

Early Child Development and Care

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“…The theoretical reason was that there is a relationship between the quality of mediation and the quality of student learning and development (Feuerstein & Feuerstein 1991;Mehl 1991;Shur, Skuy, Zietsman & Fridjhon 2002;Vygotsky 1978) so that the extent of enhancement of learning is likely to be greater the greater the quality of mediation. The practical reason for strong mediation had to do with the efficient use of available time: strong mediation was more likely to lead to time efficiency than weak mediation.…”

Section: Design Principlesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Case Study in the Development of an Innovative Pedagogy

Woollacott¹

2015

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education - On Its Constitution and Transformative Potential

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INTRODUCTIONThe focus of this chapter is the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) at the 'coalface' of teaching undergraduate students. It will describe the design and imple mentation of an innovative, activelearning technique termed 'MediatedInteraction Groups' or MIGs. The development of this technique is an interesting case study of how reflective practice in addressing teaching and learning challenges led to a new kind of intervention, which then evolved further into a more settled pedagogy through a process that involved engagement with the literature, evaluation of the implemented pedagogy, and contact with the wider community of higher education practice.The chapter is divided into five sections. The first presents, with little preamble, the MIG pedagogy that has been developed and explains briefly its objective and underlying rationale. The second section outlines the context in which the pedagogy was developed and briefly reviews relevant literature. The third section explains how the pedagogy evolved, and the fourth how it has been evaluated -how students experienced the MIG sessions and how these sessions impacted their learning. The fifth section is a reflection on the MIG methodology and its development from the point of view of SoTL and its transformative potential. The section also includes a more personal reflection on how the development of the innovation and my attempts to dissemination awareness of the methodology have impacted me as a teacher and researcher. THE SCHOLARSHIP OF TEACHING AND LEARNING IN HIGHER EDUCATION THE MIG METHODOLOGYThe objective of the MIG methodology is to enhance student learning through the agency of mediation processes that operate in a group discussion that is strongly guided. It is based on a wellknown finding that significant learning benefits accrue when a student articulates his or her ideas and thinking in an interactive learning environment (Goos, Galbraith & Renshaw 2002). The methodology was developed for firstyear students in an engineering programme as an intervention to improve their understanding of important concepts which they found difficult to grasp.The MIG format is summarised graphically in Figure 4.1. It consists of four 'parti cipants', at least ten 'observers' and a strong mediator, all seated around a table as shown. The visible activity occurs in the 'circle of interaction' and consists of the participants being drawn by the mediator into a discussion around topics relevant to the course material. Each MIG session is of short duration -between 30 and 40 minutes. Resources to help facilitate the discussion are available in the form of a chalkboard and a table for any materials or equipment that may be needed.Observers do not participate actively in the discussion except on rare occasions at the mediator's discretion. However, from one MIG session to the next, students rotate between being observers and participants so that over a period of time every student has the opportunity to engage as a participant several times during a semester....

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“…However, it is not clear whether the use of a globe by grade 2 students leads to integration of knowledge, even if explanations seem more elaborated in the presence of the globe. Continuous mediation is indispensable to sustain motivation, to point at differences and apparent contradictions between the perspectives, and to integrate them (Schur et al 2002;Schur and Kozulin 2008). We borrowed activities designed from the Thinking Journey, an educational initiative focused on the resolution of contradictions between perspectives, and by such, at overcoming problems of egocentricity in science education: students are invited to take part in a mediated journey to faraway places where they have to orient themselves (Schur and Galili 2008).…”

Section: The Design Of Environments For Combining Inquiry-based and Amentioning

confidence: 99%

Perspective taking and synchronous argumentation for learning the day/night cycle

Schwarz

Schur

Pensso

et al. 2010

Computer Supported Learning

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Changing practices in schools is a very complex endeavor. This paper is about new practices we prompted to foster collaboration and critical reasoning in science classrooms: the presentation of pictures representing different perspectives, small group synchronous argumentation, and moderation of synchronous argumentation. A CSCL tool helped in supporting synchronous argumentation through graphical representations of argumentative moves. We checked the viability of these practices in science classrooms. To do so, we investigated whether these practices led to conceptual learning, and undertook interactional analyses to study the behaviors of students and teachers. Thirty-two Grade 8 students participated in a series of activities on the day/night cycle. Learning was measured by the correctness of knowledge, the extent to which it was elaborated, the mental models that emerged from the explanations, the knowledge integration in explanations, and their simplicity. We showed that participants could learn the day/night cycle concept, as all measures of learning improved. For some students, it even led to conceptual change. However, the specific help provided by teachers during collective argumentation did not yield additional learning. The analysis of protocols of teacher-led collective argumentation indicated that although the teachers' help was needed, some teachers had difficulties monitoring these synchronous discussions. We conclude that the next step of the design-research cycle should be devoted to (a) the development of new tools directed at helping teachers facilitate synchronous collective argumentation, and to (b) activities including teachers, designers, and researchers for elaborating new strategies to use these tools to improve the already positive learning outcomes from synchronous argumentation.

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A Thinking Journey Based on Constructivism and Mediated Learning Experience as a Vehicle for Teaching Science to Low Functioning Students and Enhancing Their Cognitive Skills

Cited by 13 publications

References 9 publications

Caregivers' mediation and toddlers' emotional responses in the child care context

Caregivers' mediation and toddlers' emotional responses in the child care context

A Case Study in the Development of an Innovative Pedagogy

Perspective taking and synchronous argumentation for learning the day/night cycle

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