The Rapid and Profound Spread of Deep Learning With Collaborative Professionalism

• In Event: 66.024 - From Professional Collaboration to Collaborative Professionalism

Abstract

This research reports on an initiative called ‘New pedagogies for deep learning’, that we now call Deep Learning (DL). The premise is that current schooling is increasingly irrelevant to students, their needs, and the needs of society. Evidence shows that almost 2/3 of students have low or little engagement in school learning by grade 10 (Jenkins, 2013). This includes students who have traditionally done well. It is also a percentage that is on the rise. This trend is accompanied by global developments of students of all ages showing evidence of greater anxiety and stress; of increasing and relentless trends of inequality in and out of school; and of an unpredictable and problematic future with respect to jobs, climate, and global conflict.
In this context, four years ago we began an international development initiative called NPDL in which clusters of schools joined to help develop specific applications in their jurisdictions. The framework consisted of five components: new learning outcomes called the 6Cs (character, citizenship, collaboration, communication, creativity, critical thinking); 4 learning pillars (pedagogical practices, partnerships, learning environments, leveraging digital); school culture; local or regional infrastructure (eg school districts); and macro policies and investments at the state level).
To date, over 1000 school have joined in clusters from 7 countries: Australia, Canada, Finland, Netherlands, New Zealand, Uruguay, and the US. In implementing ‘deep learning’ in the original start-up countries with whom we have been working, data have been collected from teachers from the 1000 schools. Protocols and moderation have demonstrated several significant findings from school and cluster development. Among the findings to be reported are:
1. New approaches (described above) can result in ‘quality learning that sticks’; and learning where students ‘engage the world (in a learning mode) with a view to changing the world’.
2. Students of all ages have a propensity to work with others as ‘change agents’, especially within a theme of ‘helping humanity.’
3. Deep Learning is good for all students, but especially good for those students who are disconnected from schooling. We call this ‘the equity hypothesis’, and have some proof that attacking inequity with DL has profound payoff.
4. We have evidence that such changes spread rapidly within and across classrooms akin to a social movement.
5. Finally, this paper will focus on the role of leadership at the school and system level with respect the previous four themes.
Using the focus on DL, and a framework of ‘collaborative professionalism’ that embraces both autonomy and collaboration. I trace how DL develops within and across classrooms, across schools, and how it plays out hierarchically within systems.
The concluding section of the paper demonstrates how the speed of deep change could be a game changer for public school systems, and at the same time will show how this work raises the question that pre-occupation with literacy, numeracy and high school graduation may have become too restrictive relative to the needs of citizens for the future; and that the rapid spread of DL represents a powerful way forward.

Author

• Michael Fullan, OISE/University of Toronto