Design Challenge Five - Part 1

Everything I Ever Needed to Know About Designs for Problem-Solving

Thinking about new ways to socialize cranes, I use inductive reasoning. I need to learn from past mistakes/successes and refine and modify them, if necessary. When thinking about why specific crane pairs won't lay eggs I couldn't just assume it was because of the weather or enclosure conditions. I needed to use deductive reasoning and really determine what was true. I didn't know how much I really learned until I got out into my field and practiced those skills and knowledge. The knowledge I had after I completed my research on water usage by cranes wasn't really tested until I created a poster presentation and shared it at a national zoo conference. When I actually think about what I am doing or learning, I become better at that subject. I better understand the concepts when I have a design for learning anchored into a project. I learned about the A,B,C's....Authentic Activities, Building Knowledge Activities, Construction Activities and Sharing Activities. The knowledge we gain when activities and a culture of practice is separated from that knowledge is inert. Authentic activity is the link to the knowledge we need in our culture of practice. The best way to learn might be to intermingle general problem-solving strategies with context-specific background knowledge. I need to learn facts but I also need to have these facts connected to and organized around important concepts. Maybe the teachers shouldn't be the base of a learning opportunity...a problem should.