Journal 6

Not too much to update at this point. I've spent the past 2 weeks working through difficulties with adding images to the website. The template's Gallery option didn't work as I wanted, so I had to find a plug-in that met my needs. Once I picked the plug-in (Next Gen Gallery), I had to figure out how to make it display properly within the template. There were some frustrating moments, but I feel like it works now! I'm at somewhat of a halt at the moment; I have the website looking the way I want it with the information I've been given. It's very close to being completely finished and is just lacking a bit of information from my client. She just got home from a cruise, so I'm giving her a bit of settling in time before I bug her about these last couple of elements.

Thinking of our reading for this week, The Nature and Origin of Instructional Objects, I was able to connect most with Pillar 1:

Interactions between teacher and learner require clear communication and presentation of information. A learner-centered take on instruction would make sure the learner-as-individual gets a good message, presented in a clear way, suited to his or her prior knowledge and learning preferences, with lots of opportunities to use the new information in practice. Thus the teacher-learner relationship can rely heavily on cognitive learning psychology to achieve good transmission of information.

All of the elements listed for Pillar 1 (Cognitive Load, Instructional Guidance, Schemas, etc.) reminded me of the learner-centered "guided" teaching that has been pushed in the recent years. Guided Reading seems to have been a cornerstone of good reading instruction in the past years, but recently, there has also been a push toward Guided Math, and now I'm hearing Guided Science and Guided Social Studies. The guided teaching principles match the elements of Pillar 1, in that it is all about individualized instruction that directly meets the student's needs in a way that best appeals to each student. These instructional techniques are directly in line with cognitive psychology, but do they include any elements of the other three pillars? Yes, I agree that it is important to teach a child at his or her own instructional level, but with 100% of the focus being on these guided instructional techniques, are we leaving out the other 3 pillars?