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Learning, Teaching and Assessment: a Theoretical Overview

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Learning, Teaching and Assessment: a Theoretical Overview DOCUMENT RESUME TM 015 460 AUTHOR Black, Harry; And Others TITLE Learning, Teaching and Assessment: A Theoretical Overview. SCRE Project Report No. 20. INSTITUTION Scottish Council for Research in Education. SPONS AGENCY Scottish Education Dept., Edinburgh. REPORT NO ISBN-0-947833-43-9 PUB DATE Jun 90 NOTE 44p.; Working paper prepared as part of the first stage of the Teaching, Learning and Assessment in the National Cert:Uicate Project. AVAILABLE FROM Scottish Council for Research in Education, 15 St. John Street, Edinburgh EH8 8JR, Scotland. PUB TYPE Information Analyses (070) -- Reports - Evaluative /Feasibility (142) EDRS PRICE MFO1 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS. DESCRIPTORS *Educational Assessment; Educational Research; Educational Theories; Foreign Countries; Higher Education; *Instruction; *Learning Theories; Literature Reviews; *National Programs; Pcogram Evaluation; Research Methodology; Teacher Certification; Teacher Education; *Teaching Methods; Theory Practice Relationship IDENTIFIERS *National Certificate (Scotland) ABSTRACT _ _This_overview_of_the_literaturg, onteaching, learning, and assessment was prepared to help developa shared understanding by educators, researchers, and students to inform subsequent research conducted by the Scottish Council for Research in Education (SCRE) into the National Certificate in Scotland.Section 1 serves as an introduction to the paper. Section 2 reviews learning thaories back to the time of Plato and Aristotle. Topicsinclude: rationalism, associationism, constructivism, the cognitive information processing model, metacognition, and student-oriented approaches to understanding learning. Criticisms of each ofthese theories are provided. Section 3 reviews empirical workon teaching. The three strands identified in this area include: (1) attemptsto reconcile the nature of the teaching process with the requirementsof particular theories of learning; (2) attempts to impose descriptive categories on the process; and (3) examinations of teachers'own thinking about the teaching process. Section 4 offersan analysis of the norm-referenced and criterion-referenced traditions in assessment. Section 5 examines the ways teaching, learning, and assessment are treated in the literature concerning Scotland'sAction Plan and the criterion-referenced National Certificateprogram. Section 6 outlines the role of this overview with regard toresearch proposed under the SORE project. Five figures anda 46-item list of references are included. (SLD) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best thatcan be made from the original document. ******************X**************************************************** U.S, DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research ano Improvement "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS C EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION MATERIAL IN MICROFICHE ONLY CENTER (ERIC) HAS BEEN GRANTED BY /Msdocument has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating PaSEMilkY WAK 0 Minor charges have been made to improve reproduction Quality points of view or opinions stated in this docu ment do not necessarily represent official TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES OEM position or policy, INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)." a 11 s-'"s icV" S R Learning, Teaching and Assessment S A Theoretical Overview R Harry Black R John Hall Sue Martin R c S>:,KR C R S C E ftcC S R R E S E C E C S R C S R R E S R E SCRE s PROJECT 4s REPORTS R BEST COPY AVAILABCC E - Learning, Teaching andAssessment A Theoretical Overview Harry Black John Hall Sue Martin A working paper prepared as part of the firststage of the SED-funded Teaching, Learning and Assessment in the NationalCertificate Project The Scottish Council forResearch In Education 3 SCRE Project Report No 20 ©The Scottish Council for Research in Education June, 1990 ISBN No 0 947833 43 9 Report arising from the Teaching, Learning and Assessment in the National Certificate project (reference H/33011) funded by the Scottish Education Department between October 1988 and September 1990. note SCRE aims to make documents arising from its work widely available where possible. Reports and papers in the Project Report Series are not specially prepared for publication and are generally reproductions of these documents as they were presented to the sponsor or advisory committee. In any citation it may be useful to cite the name and reference number (where available) of the research project concerned. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Scottish Council for Research in Education. Printed by the Scottish Council for Research in Education, 15 St John Street, Edinburgh EH8 8JR 4 CONTENTS Page 1 INTRODUCTION 1 Structure Intended use 1 3 2 LEARNING 4 Classical Learning Theory 4 'Contemporary' Learning Theories Critique 6 10 3 TEACHING 12 Learning-related thinking 12 Teacher-derived thinking 13 Conceptual Categories 14 Descriptions 16 Critique 19 4 ASSESSMENT 21 Assessment as.a.Service toSchooling 2.1- Critique 25 Beyond the Theories 26 5 THEORY AND THE NATIONALCERTIFICATE 29 Learning 29 Teaching 31 Assessment 33 6 PRACTICE AND THEORY 35 REFERENCES 36 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors gratefully acknowledge the following sources for permis- sion to reproduce figures in the text of this report: The Scottish Academic Press and Dr Sally Brown for Figure 3.1 on page 15, from Brown and McIntyre (1988) 'The Professional Craft Knowledge of Teachers', Scottish Educational Review; The School of Further Education, Jordanhill College for Figure 3.2 on page 18 from Teaching Methods in Scottish FE Colleges; The further Education Unit for Figure 3.3 on page 19 from Gibbs, G. (1988) Learning by Doing, A Guide to Teaching and Learning Methods. INTRODUCTION The first stage of the 'Teaching, Learningand Assessment' in the National Certificate Project requireda review of the literature. This comprised the general literature in theseareas and the documents describing their form both in the 'Action Plan' (SED1983) and in subsequent documents published by the ScottishEducation Department and SCOTVEC. Thiswas a demanding task, not least where the 'general' literatureon teaching, learning and assessment was concerned. It was important that the team should sharea basic understanding on thinking in these arcas before our empirical dataon staff, student and employer views were gathered. Without suchan understanding, it would be difficult to agree on the nature of the questionswe wanted to ask, to be confident that we would be seeking dataon similar issues when we conductial our interviews andto know that we were defining terms in similar ways. It can be a salutory experience at the beginningof a project to force oneself to put on paper whatone knows about the topic of the research. It is surprisingly easy to forget the limitednature of one's understanding at this stage. Structure The report is presented in five sections in additionto this introduction. Section 2 is an account of thinking;tout learning. Writing about the natnre of learninggoes back to th: time of Plato and Aristotle and +he-range of theories issubstantial.It includes accounts of classical 'rationalist', 'behaviourist' and 'constructivist' -thinking-as-well- as-more- recent-- approaches:- Amongst -these are 'information processing' approaches whichare based on analogies with computer systems, student-oriented theoriesrelated to styles of learning and to learning strategies and metacognitivetheories which make claims about the importance of the consciousmanagement and monitoring of cognitive skills in effective learning.However, despite the extent of this work, there is surprisingly littleevidence of its having a direct impacton classroom practice. Empirical work on teaching which is the focus ofSection 3 has a less extensive pedigree. There is a considerablerange of writing in this area but much of it is anecdotal and represents individuals' pragmatic 'solutions' rather than firmly grounded theory.Amongst the more firmly based work we identified three strands.The first comprises attempts to reconcile the nature of the teachingprocess with the requirements of particular theories of learning. Workin this area has identified the teaching approaches appropriateto rationalist, behaviourist and constructivist theories as:insight','impression' and 'rule' models respectively andno doubt similar associations could be identified to meet the needs of metacognitivestrategies or information processing models. At a more particular levelpsychopedagogic theories have attempted to identify optimumteaching strategies for particular elements of learning suchas attaining concepts or mastering knowledge. Other studies claimto show the importance of reconciling preferred learning styles and strategieswith appropriate teaching approaches. It is work in theseareas in particular which suggests that there may be dangers in makingtoo great a distinction between teaching and learning in analysing theteaching process. Page 1 7 A second strand of the, literature on teaching comprises attempts to impose descriptive categories on the process. Amongst the most influential have been distinctions between 'traditional' and 'progressive' methods but it is not always possible to assume general agreement on how to categorise approaches. Finally, a third and more recent strand has challenged the notion of imposing categories from 'outside' teaching
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