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e-Learning Leadership Blog

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I've Got a Hunch e-Learning Could be Better

Posted by Allen Interactions on Thu, Jun 10, 2010
  
  
  

Ethan Edwards

by Ethan Edwards, chief instructional strategist

I've been playing around with a fun website, hunch.com, and its  
accompanying iPhone app, Hunchable. The premise is sort of  
preposterous but irresistible. You answer a series of questions about  
your preferences in all sorts of categories, and then the site  
assembles a portrait of you, from which it gives you suggestions about  other aspects of your life--from what car to buy (Volkswagen Jetta) to  what kind of salad to eat (Arugula with Pears and Gorgonzola), and even to if you should wear a beard (Yes). At worst, it's greatly amusing. But it can also be incredibly helpful at times in guiding you with its hunches, suggesting restaurants you might like in a new city, or bookstores you would find interesting. etc.

hunch Hunchable

 

This has made me think about how transforming this approach could be in creating truly adaptive and individualized e-learning. We have elaborately sophisticated Learning Management Systems that collect volumes of information about our learners, yet that information is rarely used to actually enhance the learner experience. If we could observe that a learner showed a preference for diving right into activities to learn by trial and error, we could use that knowledge to  
structure an experience with more learner control than for another student we knew preferred to read instructions and content carefully before being tested. If we knew that a student tended to do online assignments in short bursts, we could cue up our content in smaller, more easily chunked modules, than we would for a student who tended to like long, uninterrupted sessions.

If this sounds extreme, I'd like to remind us all that this is actually what a really good tutor does--being observant of learning styles and subtly adjusting the teaching approach of the moment to match a learner's preferences--even about things of which the learner might not be fully aware.

Even if our training programs didn't try to make predictions, but rather simply were observant and mindful of the learner, it would do wonders, I think, in engaging the learner. If I choose to skip (or fail) pretests, the lesson should quit forcing me into opportunities for guaranteed failure. If I chose to turn off the narration last  
time, then assume that that's what I still desire until I say otherwise. I think striving for this kind of personalization could translate into so much more effective interaction than superficial but ultimately irrelevant things like choosing the hairstyle for my coach avatar.

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Comments

Ruth Clark, in Evidence-Based Training Methods debunks learning styles as one of the more wasteful and misleading learning myths of the past 20 years that leads to unproductive training methods (pp. 10-12). She also summarizes the research on the relationship between learning preferences and outcomes (pp. 14-16)and points out that the relationship between liking and actual learning is very weak.
Posted @ Thursday, June 10, 2010 11:23 AM by Martin Cocchiarella
Marty, I agree that there is little conclusive evidence about learning styles. I do think that the simplistic ways in which people talk about learning styles sort of guarantees that they would be insignificant. But when one has spent any time actually teaching, one becomes critically aware of the significance of individual differences in how learners approach learning, if not specifically in how they learn. And right or wrong, adults often come to learning with a highly-developed sense of what kind of learner they are. Engagement precedes any sort of learning in an online environment, and to absolutely ignore the individuality of each learner is a sure way to limit motivation. 
 
A common learning style contrast, particularly in e-learning is comparing reading versus narration as content delivery method. I think we find that it doesn’t much matter, not because of learning styles, but rather because using the computer to force feed extensive narrative content to a learner is a particularly ineffective teaching strategy, no matter the style in which it is administered. User choice, though, does strike me as exceptionally significant in the online learning environment, where one really must take responsibility for one’s own learning. And it’s useful to provide some flexibility, not so much in that we can’t prescribe a logical order or sequence of actions that we would LIKE each learner to take, but that the benefit of putting the learner in a place to make choices acknowledges their individuality and their importance in this teaching/learning relationship. And if we can recognize patterns in how our students behave, then I think those trends could provide a nice way to enrich the dialog we can have with our learners. 
Posted @ Thursday, June 10, 2010 4:42 PM by Ethan Edwards
Individual differences are important, but I do not think they are the same as learning styles. An important individual difference is prior knowledge. Learners experienced in a content or subject area need something different than novices. Pace, sequence, and access to support are important and challenge us (instructional design professionals) to think of ways to meet the needs for the range of learners with whom we deal.
Posted @ Thursday, June 10, 2010 5:31 PM by Marty Cocchiarella
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