The Learning Paradigm College
Chapter 1-9: Week 1
The central question of the book is how the way we view students as learners makes the way we design the learning environment.
Tagg begins his book with the statement "When we see through a new lens, it is impossible to go back to thinking of the world the way we did before. " It is totally true in all cases. It is interesting that the author asks the audience to see things through new lenses which implies that we should see the teaching and learning process with a new and open eye to critique what is really happening, how to make it better and more relevant to learners.
In p. 5, Tagg compares that the organization paradigm is like a lens, the way we how we look at it will determine how we see everything else. I wonder what is the REAL purpose of college education? to educate the whole person? to become effective citizens in a democratic society? a get a better life? good salary? I guess it will be addressed differently depending on personal points of view, and which stand they are on, administrators, faculty, students, parents and what their purpose of life is. According to a senior student, "it is just a bunch of courses and then graduation". What can be done to change people's points of view about college education? Is there a need for curriculum change? What are the goals for courses?
For the majority of students, the predominant goal is grade. Why not? I agree that grade does not reflect one's capacity or knowledge. However, as far as grade is used to measure a student performance and achievement, for job application, higher degree application, considering grade as the most important goal while attending college is still a must for students and parents.
The author proposes that universities should revisit the curriculum, see it with a different lens by revisiting their assessment, pedagogy, course design, advisement, and the architecture of undergraduate education (p.9). Tagg also emphasizes that without the proof of student learning assessment, there is no way to improve the outcomes.
While reading Chapter 1, readers will wonder what are the recommendations for fundamental change in colleges and university as stated in Involvement in learning (p. 6) which is clearly stated in Chapter 2.
In Chapter 2, HE reform in the US: why innovations do not transform colleges, Tagg argues that although it is clear that the purpose of eduaction is to provide a highest quality program for all students. However, he also stresses that achieving this purpose is a hard job due to bureaucracy, regulations, apathy, and inadequate resources. And a big question is why colleges do not do what they say they want to do.
Two important concepts in this chapter is espoused theory and theory-in-use. These are the kinds of theories of action that individuals and organizations follow: the former is to govern what they claim to follow and the latter is inferred from what they do. An example of the espoused theory is the organization's mission and goals while the organizational behavior is an example of theory in use. Tagg also argues that there is always a missmatch between theory in use and espoused theory.
Tagg defines Organization Paradigm as the overall theory in use of an organization consisting of framework of examples, models and rules that define the activities of an organization and generate the new rules that govern those. It is also the lens through which people in an organization see the organization and their role in that organization. He pointed out that besides the fact that poilicy makers are guided by economic motives instead of educational consideration as stated by Astin (1993), the meaning of education changed, the Institution Paradigm changed. Courses and to put more students in courses seem to be the mission of many colleges and universities these days. And universities become "factories for the production of full time equivalent students, transcript-generating machines".
Chapter 3: The Instruction Paradigm
In Chapter 3, Tagg states that one needs to have a new paradigm. So far we focused on formal institutional processes (courses, transcripts) rather than the purpose of education.The core of the Instruction Paradigm is to provide instruction, but instruction is not the only mission of a HE institution. The Instruction Paradigm determines and is determined by organizational structure, defined as the "features of an organiazation that are stable over time and that form the framework within which activities and processes occur and through which the purposes of an organization are achieved" (p.23). And this structure will affect the subsystems of an organization including faculty and administration, curriculum, calendar, assessment and pedagogy, and criteria for success and accountability.
Chapter 4: The Route to Transformation: The Learning Paradigm
According to Tagg, the Learning Paradigm puts purpose before processes, focuses on students, emphasizes on the outcomes, and sees the whole experience of the students. The core of the Learning Paradigm is a teaching-learning process that focuses on learner learning.The perspective of the Learning Paradigm is to think of student learning first, then revisit and redesign the academic work to achieve the end.He stresses that the Learning Paradigm organization is the one that produces learning and the one that learns.
However, there are still objections to the Learning Paradigm and Tagg argues that these objections are not totally true.
Part 2: The Foundation: The Learners and the Learning:
Chapter 5 answers who the learners will be and how they should learn. One of the barrier to better learning comes from the beliefs students hold about colleges in general.
These are some of their characteristics:
- fail to recognize the value of learning
- their highschool experience place challenges when they enter college
- fail to make transition to college
- physically present but psychologically absent
- spend less time studying than those "in the old days"
Why so?
- the diploma requires no real engagement
- if trying hard in highschool, it is because of getting good grade to enter colleges
He concludes that changing the way students think about academic work is really challenging.
Chapter 6, Self-Theories and Academic Motivation, states that many mistaken beliefs students hold about schooling derive from dysfunctional beliefs about themselves and their ability.
Tagg argues that depending on students' self theories, the belief about themselves, the way students think and attend to information about their own performance will be different and the experience of schooling seems to shape these self theories. He also distinguishes between an entity theorist, a person believing intelligence is fundamental , unchangeable and a incremental theorist who believe that intelligence and ability is changeable. Research shows that incremental theorist students have the tendency to be more confident, easily to make improvement in class than the entity theory ones.
Tagg raises the idea of considering learning as a process of failure and students should learn not to fear being failed. Research shows that American students do not work hard as compared to Asian students due to the belief that school achievement depends on innate intelligence rather than hard work. He concludes that the mission of universities and colleges is to change the belief of students about themselves and their belief about academic institutions.
Chapter 7: Approaches to Learning
Education is about conceptual change, not the acquisition of info. (p. 62). There are 2 approaches to learning: surface learning, which focuses on the sign, and deep learning focusing on understanding the meaning. Table 7.1 (p. 81) describes different characteristics between deep and surface learning. Tagg emphasizes that colleges should promote deep orientation to learning.
The learning environment has an effect on student orientation to learning. And the dysfunctional beliefs about schooling comes from what they learn in school. In other words, the failure of learning is the product of the school environment. Chapter 8 will address the issue of how to shape the environment for more effective learning.
Part 3: The Learning Environment of the College
Chapter 8: The Whole that Determines the Parts
The learning environment is more than just the classroom. Chapter 8 proposes using cognitive economy, one that promotes a deep orientation to learning, encouragement of risk taking and promotion of incremental self-theories, as a framework reflecting on the learning environment. Tagg also an analyzes the six characteristics of the cognitive economy including goals, activity, information, time, community, and alignment. He also makes a distinction between a hot and cool cognitive economy.
Chapter 9 describes how the Instruction Paradigm produces a cool cognitive economy and the need for paradigm shift which will be addressed in Part 4 of Tagg's work. Tagg argues that the academic calendar, the grading process shape the cognitive economy students experience. He analyzes how the Instruction Paradigm college performs and what is the production of a cool cognitive economy by analyzing six categories mentioned in Chapter 8.
- Goals: The Instruction Paradigm college encourages students to pursue extrinsic goals. He argues that grades, personal goals for students, are performance goals, and that such an assessment system impacts the whole system and shapes student perceptions and expectations. Grades are the most important thing students bring away from college.
- Activity: The Instruction Paradigm college devalues student performance. By activity, he implies how active students are, how much time they spend for learning, and what kind of work they are doing. Tagg argues that student performances are secondary, artificial while the teacher's evaluation of the student, the grade, is primary. He concludes that a system that promotes extrinsic goals will follow a surface approach.
- Information: Maximizing evaluation and minimizing feedback. Grades are final, so they are evaluation, not feedback. Institutions highlight assessment as evaluation. The Institution Paradigm college disminishes the role of assessment as feedback.
Time: Instruction Paradigm colleges impose a short time horizon on learning. Courses designed with final exams make studetns forget what they have learned. Final examinations eliminate the requirement of further study (p. 111).
- Community: Instruction Paradigm colleges isolate students from supportive communities. He concludes that students who seek support from their peers, faculty and staff members persist and succeed in college.
- Alignment: At Instruction Paradigm colleges, elements of the cognitive economy are usually misaligned.
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