Placing Learning, Beliefs, and Research at the Center of Teaching Educational Psychology

• In Event: Iron Instructor: Educational Psychology—Harnessing the Power of Educational Research for Practice

Abstract

Two incidents caused me to rethink my overall approach to teaching educational psychology. The first incident occurred in undergraduate course. I organized a class session into a series of learning centers that the class transitioned through in teams. The session seemed to go well; one student even commented “This is like circuit training for your brain!” After the centers we took time to debrief and discuss the students’ with the learning centers. As I listened to my class, it occurred to me that something was amiss in the discussion. I asked the class “Did I teach today?” The immediate response from more than half the class was “Well, no.” and “Not really.” Silence. Then the discussion got good as the class dissected just what is teaching and whether I had taught that day or not. (Turns out I did). This unearthed a teaching problem, the need to be explicit about why I teach the way I do. I was able to bring the discussion around to “what is teaching” but this was due more to a happy accident than an intentional pedagogical decision.

The second incident occurred while I was writing a theoretical chapter on the functions of teachers’ personal epistemologies as filters of information, frames for task analysis, and guides for decision making (Fives & Buehl, under review). At the end of the chapter we described three recommendations for teacher educators that I consider essential, and yet I have only implemented on a random or ad hoc basis in my own classes. Thus, I realized that in a very real way I was not using research (my own) to influence practice (my own) around concepts that I believe are central to teaching.

Renninger (1996) described the design of her educational psychology course in which she made “Learning as the Focus.” In this piece she describes how the course design and organizing questions were framed to centralize learning and its role in teaching. Further, her piece responded to Anderson et al.’s (1996) call for changes in how we teach educational psychology.

As I engage in the restructuring of my course I am inspired by Renninger’s (1996) paper and my research. Thus, the class will be focused on learning, beliefs, and research with an eye to facilitating self-regulation for my students as first learners, then teachers (Dembo, 2001). Additional adaptations will address contextual differences, my course is a pre-requisite for students who wish to apply to our teacher education program, it fulfills a general-education requirement, and is taught without a field or laboratory experience embedded into the course. The diversity of students enrolled in the course, the lack of a field component, and the time between when this course is taken and when they enter the teacher education program often make it challenging for students to connect what they are learning with their own beliefs about learning and teaching and their potential future practice. Focusing on learning, beliefs, and research however may provide a lens that is relevant for all students.

Author

• Helenrose Fives, Montclair State University