Reflection #16

(1) Describe the Resource / Experience:
This week, during my resource search, I discovered a lot of resources that discussed how social or group learning enhances and complements student responsibility and initiative and individual learning in the constructivist classroom. The most interesting of these resources was a WikiBook excerpt entitled “Socio-Constructivist Learning Theory”. This excerpt discussed the idea of “distributed cognition”, and according to EduTech Wiki “Distributed cognition refers to a process in which cognitive resources are shared socially in order to extend individual cognitive resources or to accomplish something that an individual agent could not achieve alone” (EduTech Wiki, no page numbers). I found the idea of “distributed cognition” to be very interesting and I thought it kind of reflected the interactions we have during our group work in this class.
(2) Lessons Learned / Applications for the Classroom / Recommendations for Yourself or Others:
Before conducting research for this WikiText chapter, I never really thought about how social learning and increased student initiative and responsibility seemingly conflict with one another. However, this idea was promptly brought to my attention at the beginning of this module of the WikiText. It prompted me to think about our group interactions within this class. We work together in a social context to create, author, and organize these WikiText chapters, but we all have to take individual initiative and individual responsibility to complete our assigned jobs/roles. As for classroom application, after conducting this research, I would like to investigate the idea of “distributed cognition” even further so I can use more “distributed cognition” strategies/activities in my own personal classroom
(3) Links to Readings, Resources, or Discussions:
These ideas directly relate to the following resource from my resource log:

EduTech Wiki. (2007, November 16). Socio-constructivist learning theory. MediaWiki. Retrieved from http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/Socio-constructivism

Moreover, even though our WikiText chapter hasn’t been finished and posted yet, I’m sure these ideas will directly relate to our latest chapter entitled “Constructivism and the Individual Learners’ Responsibilities and Leadership”.