Exploring the learning opportunities of an innovative teaching method in a constructivist classroom environment

Session Time and Location

Date:
Wed, 6 Jun 2018
Time:
Time:
9:15am to 10:45am
Room: Room:
Oakwood A
Session Track
  • Teaching and Learning
Session Format
  • Paper

Speaker(s)

Salome Smit

Student-centred teaching strategies were adopted to align with institutional transformations. The aim was to explore the opportunities of an innovative teaching method, within a constructivist classroom environment. Students construct knowledge and meaning from their experiences during the learning activity by constructing a basic 3D model from modelling material, according to their prior knowledge of the normal anatomy of the structure. The student then trace the progression of changes instigated by the disease by changing the model according to the stages as the disease progresses, until the end stage of the disease. Evidence confirmed the effectiveness of the learning activity.

 

  • Session References +

    BROWN WRIGHT, G. 2011. Student-centered learning in higher education. International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 23:92-97.

     

    CONCEPT TO CLASSROOM. 2004. Constructivism as a paradigm for teaching and learning. [ONLINE] Available at:

    http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/constructivism/index_sub1.html [Accessed: 10/03/2018].

     

    HARVEY, L. & KNIGHT, P.T. 1996. Transforming Higher Education. SRHE and Open University Press: Buckingham.

     

    HESA. 2010. Sector Position Paper on the Report of the Ministerial Committee on

    transformation and social cohesion and the elimination of discrimination in South

    Africa’s public Higher Education institutions, published March 2010.

     

    HUTCHINGS, P. & HUBER, M. 2008. Placing theory in the scholarship of teaching. Arts and Humanities in Higher Education, 7:229-244.

     

    PIAGET, J. 1926. The Language and Thought of the Child. Harcourt, Brace & Company: New York.

     

    SLAVICH, G.M. & ZIMBARDO, P.G. 2012. Transformational teaching: theoretical underpinnings, basic principles, and core methods. Educational Psychology Review, 24:569-608.

     

    SVINIVKI, M.D. & MCKEACHIE, W.J. 2011. McKeachie's Teaching Tips: Strategies, Research, and Theory for College and University Teachers. Wadsworth: Belmont, CA.

     

    THE UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY. 2018. Constructivism. [ONLINE] Available at: http://sydney.edu.au/education_social_work/learning_teaching/ict/theory/constructivism.shtml [Accessed: 10 March 2018].

Slides: 
PDF icon ICED2018 SR Smit Presentation.pdf