Anchored Instruction: Origins and Perspectives

Anthony Petrosino The University of Texas

October 9, 2007

Harvard Graduate School of Education

Outline for Presentation •  Introduction to CTGV •  Define Some Terms •  NAEP Trends •  Word Problems •  Facts vs. Problems •  Anchored Instruction in

Detail •  Demos and Bootlegs

CTGV? LTC?

•  Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt (joint authorship entity)

•  Learning Technology Center (physical) •  Multidisciplinary group of researchers

including educators, content experts, instructional technology experts, cognitive psychologists…

John Bransford Washington

Jim Pellegrino UIC

Bob Sherwood Indiana

Ted Hasselbring Vanderbilt

Susan Goldman UIC

Sean Brophy Purdue

Cindy Hmelo Rutgers

Chuck Kinzer Teachers College

Taylor Martin Texas Susan Williams Dan Schwartz

Stanford

Dan Hickey Indiana

Jay Pfaffman Tennessee

Mitch Nathan Wisconsin

Joyce Moore Iowa

Xiodong Lin Teachers College

Tony Petrosino Texas

Mutliple Content Areas •  Mathematics

•  Science

•  Reading

•  Health •  Special Education •  Pre-School

•  The Adventures of Jasper Woodbury

•  Scientists in Action/Mission to Mars

•  Young Kids Literacy Project/Read 180

•  Diabetes Project •  To Kill a Mockingbird

•  Ribbit (Sunburst)

Anyone? Anyone?

•  The clip that launched a thousand presentations

•  Example of instruction we can all identify in one manner or another

Definition

•  Anchored Instruction- – A technique of situating instruction in a

variety of real-life settings (often simulated) to aid reflection, transfer, and higher level problem solving.

Related Words and Concepts

•  Cognitive Apprenticeship- enculturating students into authentic practice through activity and social interaction- similar to craft apprenticeship

•  Collaborative Learning- Collective problem solving

Principles of Anchored Instruction

•  Learning and Teaching activities should be designed around an “anchor” which should be some sort of case-study or problem situation.

•  Curriculum materials should allow exploration by the learner (e.g., random access, CD-ROM, DVD, etc…)

Major Goal of Anchored Instruction

•  To overcome the problem of inert knowledge. To create environments that permit sustained exploration by students and teachers, enable them to understand the kinds of problems and opportunities that experts in various areas encounter and the knowledge that these experts use as tolls.

Longitudinal Look- NAEP

•  “The Nation’s Report Card” •  Fairly flat trend lines over the past 25

years (upward trend for past decade) •  NAEP shows that the “educational

crisis” is not one of decline; it is one of stagnation and inability to keep pace with society’s expectations

NAEP- A Deeper look

•  Levels of Proficiency- MATH –  150 Simple arithmetic facts –  200 Beginning skills and understanding –  250 Basic operations and beginning problem

solving –  300 Moderately complex procedures and

reasoning –  350 Multi-step problem solving and algebra –  500 ill structured, multistep problems

NAEP-Math Results

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10

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30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

13 17Age of Students

Level 3Level 5

NAEP: Science, Reading, and Writing

•  Science- 300 Level or better – 13 year olds: 9.4% – 17 year olds: 41.4%

Similar shortcomings in reading and writing

NAEP

•  Most students can remember facts, solve textbook problems and apply formulas

•  Seemingly can not rise above rote, factual level to think critically or creatively in solving ill-structured, ambiguous problems that require interpretation

Word Problems

•  One bus can carry 60 people. If 140 people have to be transported, how many buses must be rented? (Silver 1986)

•  Answer?

Word Problems

•  Word problems are supposed to teach problem solving and show how math is useful in everyday life.

•  Unfortunately, as often taught, they generally tend to do neither.

Word Problems

•  “Word problems are the black hole of middle school mathematics: a lot of energy goes in and no light comes out”

-  John Bruer Schools For Thought (1993)

Why so Difficult?

•  Often the simplicity and artificiality of word problems undermine their purported educational proposes.

•  Word problems are posed FOR the students rather than BY the students. –  If our goal is to better prepare students for

problem solving than we need to keep in mind that problem posing is an important problem solving skill.

Why so Difficult?

•  Word problems are typically presented without any context other than where they happen to be placed in the textbook –  Problems about urns, trains leaving from stations,

and blending teas follow one another. –  Rather than rooted in everyday life, word problems

insulate math from the real world of the student.

Why so Difficult?

•  Children generally do not like word problems, do not understand their purpose, and see them as another weird task in math class (Cognition and Technology Group, 1991).

Theoretical Basis: Representations and Inert

Knowledge •  Generally, children will use the skills or

strategies immediately after instruction but won’t spontaneously use them later. Yet, if they can describe these strategies, the knowledge is in their memories. Therefore….

•  Being able to recall information from long term memory (LTM) when asked/prompted does not guarantee spontaneous use of that information when it is needed or useful.

•  Cognitive psychologists call this knoweldge INERT KNOWLEDGE.

Key Idea

•  The difference between recalling information when asked and using it without prompting when appropriate depends on how the knowledge is stored in memory.

Fact vs Problem Oriented Problem Solving

Task

•  Had students read typical middle school science texts in the areas of: – Nutritional value of food groups – Water as a standard density of liquids – Solar powered airplanes – How Bronze-Age humans made oil lamps

Experimental Task

Fact-oriented learning

Problem-oriented learning

“remember as much as you can”

“read the passage as if you were preparing for A trip down the Amazon”

Experimental Task (testing recall)

Fact-oriented learning

Problem-oriented learning

“Imagine you are planning a trip to the desert…list and discuss 10 issues you would need to address in planning the trip.

“Imagine you are planning a trip to the desert…list and discuss 10 issues you would need to address in planning the trip.

Experimental Task (Results of recall)

Fact-oriented learning

Problem-oriented learning

-Never mentioned any of the information they just read -Gave vague answers

-Spontaneously used infor- mation from the passages they read and specifically mentioned: kinds of food, weight of water, availabilty of solar vs gasoline power in the desert.

Problem-Oriented Learning Works…but why?

•  Students learn in a context that is similar to the eventual problem solving situation – This helps them associate new knoweldge

with conditions in which they might use it – The more context, the more associations – Use knoweldge more flexibly- even in new

situations

Raiders of the Lost Ark Study

•  Rich problem context

•  Accessible to poor readers

•  First 12 minutes of movie

•  All information needed was in the video

Comparison Group

•  Individual instruction •  Intensive instruction •  Traditional

instruction –  All based on word

problems

Word Problem Test

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40

60

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PreTest Posttest

Traditional

Video Based

Transfer Task

•  “non-Indy” context •  Traditional students

showed no improvement

•  Video based students scored 60 percent correct (50% higher than pretest)

Limitations of Movies for Educational Purposes

•  Not made with instruction in mind

•  Can only cover so much curriculum

•  Copyright and other legal issues

Production of Video Adventures

•  Production of River Adventure

•  Plan details of a 1 week cruise

•  Figure out boat’s cruising speed

•  How much fuel and water to take

•  Boat’s length River Adventure

1956 Chris-Craft Cruiser

Replication Study Planning Problems

Problem Finding

No Math Use

Low 5th Graders

Poor Poor Poor

High 5th Graders

Poor Poor Poor

College Students

Good Good Good

Learning with Video •  Results suggested

video contexts might be of value for ALL students

•  Teachers were excited by multi-step problems.

•  Concerned about quality (homemade) and need for narrative structure.

General Guidelines •  Strong story line •  Familiar characters •  Video format would be

inclusive for poor readers

•  Connect everyday experiences to school mathematics

•  All clues included but problem solving needed

Journey to Cedar Creek •  Jasper wants to buy a

cruiser •  Meets Sal and decides

to buy it •  Running lights don’t

work-off the river by sunset

•  Can he make it back from Cedar Creek to Cumberland City in time?

The Challenge

•  When should Jasper leave for home?

•  Can he make it without running out of fuel?

Test feasibility of plan against constraints

Time Fuel

Distance

Constraints Met?

Can Do

New Plan: Get fuel at Willies

Yes No

Test feasibility

Time Fuel

Distance

Money

Constraints Met? No

Can’t Make It Can Do

Yes

Test feasibility of plan against constraints

Time Fuel

Distance

Constraints Met?

Can Do

New Plan: Get fuel at Willies

Yes No

Test feasibility

Time Fuel

Distance

Money

Constraints Met? No

Can’t Make It Can Do

Yes

Early Findings Preliminary Studies

–  w/o hints 50% college students were correct; with 70% were correct

–  W/o hints 1 of 11 above average 6th graders were correct; with prompts 18% were correct

–  Both groups had trouble with multi-step probelms

•  Classroom Studies –  High affect of desire to

want to learn more –  Both high and low ability

students improved on generation problems and multi-step problems

–  No difference on standardized tests

–  Non-traditional students did very well

–  Worked on the problem outside of class

–  High teacher adaption rates

The Jasper Woodbury Series

Origins

The Overturned Tanker

Mission to Mars (NASA)

http://www.utexas.edu/courses/edc371/movie/marsref.mov

Advantages of Anchored Instruction

•  Everyone involved with a common background around the subject matter

•  Visual hands-on aspects allow poor readers to participate in class discussion and problem solving

•  Facilitates communication between students •  Students are free to discover new issues

about the subject

Challenges of Anchored Instruction

•  Teacher must change roles from “provider of information” to “conductor” or fellow learner.

•  Lesson plans are not fully scripted. •  How to help students w/o being totally

directive •  How to fit Anchored Instruction into existing

curriculum and make sure it meets needs regarding mandated testing.

Problem Generation

Scientists in Action Jasper Woodbury Mission to Mars

Less Generative More Generative

- Multiple Segments - Challenges at end of each segment

- Single Segment - Pose own problems

- Single Segment - Challenges at end Of segment

PBI-UTeach

Anchored Instruction and UTeach

•  Used in Project Based Instruction •  http://www.edb.utexas.edu:16080/

anchorvideo/theory.php

•  http://www.utexas.edu/courses/edc371/movie/marsref.mov