Quest for Learning - Marie Alcock

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where knowledge is organized around important ideas and concepts and the expectation is that students are examining deeply to determine generalizations, connections, and patterns (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000). Engagement increases when teachers introduce and students pursue quests. Teachers design them to become increasingly student driven as they progress. While the teacher and student clarify the why, the student takes a much more significant role in developing what to learn and how to demonstrate that learning.

      This chapter examines the realities of sit-and-get learning or lower-level thinking such as Benjamin Bloom’s (1956) remember and understand in many classrooms and explains why questing, which requires apply and evaluate, is preferable. To begin questing, teachers can tap into what moves students and tie those topics into the required standards to increase engagement, embrace technology, and build a community of learners.

      In 1930, students were being prepared for jobs that valued a command-and-obey structure with clear hierarchies. In 2017, employers lament that students struggle to think, create, and problem solve because of lack of school experience and training (Breene, 2016). Because the post–World War II factory boom has evolved into another kind of global job market, virtually every job, blue and white collar, requires employees to regularly solve a range of intellectual and technical problems (Wagner, 2010). Some blame the absence of problem solving and creativity on a “general lack of curiosity” (Wagner, 2010, p. xxiii). A lack of curiosity might explain so little engagement, as might a linear, teacher-led process filled with content acquisition. Because people can easily access information, they no longer have to memorize it for retrieval. The sit-and-get pedagogy favors isolated academic experiences and progress in tight sequence.

      Students can feel at a loss when these important small parts do not connect to broader concepts or applications. For instance, when students memorize words for weekly spelling tests, the words are isolated. There is no connection to bigger ideas or related texts. Students wonder why teachers compel them to memorize the words. Worse, they grow accustomed to passively receiving assignments that someone else designed and content curated completely. They may participate in completing the assignments, but are not engaged.

      This book is a sort of macroscope, as opposed to a microscope, for looking at the learning process. With this macroscope, you can see connections between our content and ideas. A questing framework offers both—specific content and skills instruction as well as empowering, purposeful learning experiences. There is no need to decide between ensuring coverage and digging deep into Bloom’s (1956) higher-level-thinking skills of applying and evaluating.

      It is time for schooling to distinguish itself from a culture that required seat time, regimented curriculum pace, and relentless standardized testing. Questing is a solid step toward a more responsive learning experience that encourages curiosity, creativity, and problem solving.

      Teachers need their students’ hearts and minds when they teach the curriculum. The challenge is how to create the favorable conditions for that attention that is in line with what we know about the brain. Neural connections and long-term memories result when teachers combine emotionally compelling classwork and personal relevance (Bernard, 2010). Research proves that “choice plays a critical role in promoting students’ intrinsic motivation and deep engagement in learning” (Evans & Boucher, 2015).

      How learners feel about the learning also relates to their likelihood of engaging and further development. Neuroscientist Lila Davachi and her colleagues Tobias Kiefer, David Rock, and Lisa Rock (2010) describe this as being in a toward state or an away state. At the neurological level, the brain perceives what’s happening in the moment and classifies it as good (students want to move toward it and engage) or bad (students want to move away from it and disengage). We can describe the toward state as active learning because it’s building and reinforcing neurological pathways (Davachi et al., 2010). When a teacher helps students discover connections, students feel more creative and have a greater capacity to stick with something or tackle new problems. The converse can be said when the brain is in the away state, because the brain focuses on following directions. The away response occurs when people cannot connect to previous knowledge, feel no sense of autonomy, do not feel part of a group, or have their status threatened. This is why spending time and attention on the why and how we think and work together—questing essentials—increases the likelihood students will engage.

      Computer use varies widely by nation, but over 50 percent of students have access to classroom computers in countries around the world (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2012). In U.S. elementary and middle schools, 31 percent of students use a digital device that the school supplies. A full third of high schoolers use school-provided technology, whether it’s to research, communicate with teachers or other students, take tests online, or photograph deliverables (Project Tomorrow, 2013). Despite the digital divide, or many schools’ continued lack of access, technology use seems to be trending upward in classrooms and in education generally. A 2012 Interactive Educational Systems Design survey shows just over 50 percent of participants using mobile technology; a follow-up survey in 2014 shows that 71 percent of participants use mobile technology (as cited in STEMReports, 2014).

      A tremendous infusion of technology in schools has changed what, when, where, and with whom we learn. Technology also changes how we demonstrate learning (Zmuda et al., 2015). This digital proliferation stems from teachers providing access to information and global educational opportunities as well as from students being raised in a culture of ubiquitous touch screens and online applications (Mitra, 2010).

      Generation Z, born between 1995 and 2009, and Generation Alpha, born after 2010, use technology not only to retrieve information but also to entertain themselves and learn. Students from these generations perceive effective classrooms differently than their predecessors (McCrindle, 2014). Table 1.1 reveals those differences.

       Table 1.1: Differences in Effective Engagement

Generation Z and Generation Alpha Previous Generations
Visual Verbal
Try and see Sit and listen
Facilitator Teacher
Flexibility Security
Collaborating Commanding
Learner centered Curriculum centered
Open-book assessments Closed-book exams
Touch technology and electronic devices Books and paper

      Source: Adapted from McCrindle, 2014.

      The shift from keyboard to touch interface changed learners. Students expect to interact with content and people differently than previous generations did. They seek, process, and share information more visually, collaboratively, and in real time. What better motivation for questing’s instructional framework, which naturally puts teachers and students in the driver’s seat.

      Effective questing involves others. Collaboration via networking is possible in physical interactions, but being able to use digital tools for virtual learning connections is essential. Without the increasingly available connected tools and devices, students will not be adequately prepared.

      Social networks also have a significant impact on

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