Use learningstyles&communitiesofpracticeinclassroom.winona

Charissa Eaton
Oswald Shanalingigwa
Jay Palmer

 Apply learning styles to increase student
learning
 Utilize engaged pedagogy (service learning)
as a classroom strategy to support student
skill development and critical thinking.
 Use “community of practice” as a
framework for classroom culture.

 Previous definitions of intelligence were
limited to aspects that focused on success in
school
 These definitions were empirically based
 Gardner (1983) took a different direction in
examining a broader scope to define
intelligence including abilities related to the
arts
 He is explicit that his work does not follow
the line of preexisting psychometric
instruments

 Linguistic
 Logical-Mathematical
 Spatial
 Bodily Kinesthetic
 Musical
 Interpersonal
 Intrapersonal
 Naturalist (Gardner, 1999)

 Sensitivityto the sounds, rhythms, and
meanings of words; sensitivity to the
different functions of language
 Learning
 Think: in words
 Love: reading, writing, telling stories, playing
word games
 Need: books, writing tools, discussion, debate,
stories
 Teaching Preparation
 How can I use written or spoken word?

 Sensitivity to, and capacity to discern,
logical or numerical patterns; ability to
reason well.
 Learning
 Think: in reasoning
 Love: experimenting, questioning, figuring out
logical puzzles, calculating
 Need: materials to experiment and manipulate
 How can I bring in numbers, classifications, or
critical thinking skills?

 The ability to perceive the visual-spatial
world accurately and to perform
transformations on these perceptions.
 Learning
 Think in images and pictures
 Love: designing, drawing, visualizing, doodling
 Need: art, videos, power points, puzzles,
illustrations
 How can I use visual aides, visualization, color, or
art?

 Abilitiesto control one’s body movements
and handle objects skillfully.
 Learning
 Think: through somatic sensations
 Love: building, touching, gesturing
 Need: role play, movement, tactile experiences,
hands on learning
 How can I involve the whole body or hands on
experiences?

 The capacity to perceive, discriminate,
transform, and express musical forms.
 Learning
 Think: via rhythms and melodies
 Love: singing, humming, tapping feet/hands,
listening
 Need: music playing, connecting content to song
 How can I bring in music or sounds, or set key
points in a rhythmic or melody framework?

 Capacitiesto discern and respond
appropriately to the moods, temperaments,
motivations, and desires of other people.
 Learning
 Think: by bouncing ideas off of other people
 Love: leading, organizing, relating, mediating,
partying
 Need: friends, group games, community events,
social gatherings
 How can I engage students in peer sharing,
cooperative learning, or large-group simulation?

 Access to one’s own feelings and the ability to
discriminate among them and draw upon them to
guide behavior; knowledge of one’s own
strengths, weaknesses, desires, and
intelligences.
 Learning
 Think: in relation to their needs, feelings, and goals
 Love: setting goals, dreaming, planning, reflecting
 Need: time alone, self-paced projects, choices
 How can I evoke personal feelings or memories or give
students choices?

 Expertise in recognition and classification of the
numerous species (flora and fauna) of an
individual’s environment including natural
phenomena.
 Learning
 Think: through nature and natural forms
 Love: working with animals, gardening, investigating
nature, caring for the planet
 Need: access to nature, opportunities for interacting
with animals and nature
 How can I incorporate living things, natural
phenomena, or ecological awareness?

 Armstrong (2000) developed the inventory
based on Gardner’s work
 It is not a test…rather an inventory designed
to help learners connect to information
 Not evaluated for reliability and validity

 High
 Interpersonal
 219 out of 846 responses* (26%)
 Bodily-Kinesthetic
 Low
 Logical-Mathematical
 Naturalistic

* This is based on number of responses versus number of
students as some students reported more than one high
category.

1. Identify as a professional social worker and conduct myself
accordingly.
2. Apply social work ethical principles to guide professional practice.
3. Apply critical thinking to inform and communicate professional
judgments.
4. Engage diversity and difference in practice.
5. Advance human rights and social and economic justice.
6. Engage in research-informed practice and practice-informed
research.
7. Apply knowledge of human behavior and the social environment.
8. Engage in policy practice to advance social and economic well-being
and to deliver effective social work services.
9. Respond to the ever changing organizational, community, and societal
contexts by using knowledge and skill to respond proactively.
10. Conduct the engagement process with clients.
11. Conduct assessments of clients.
12. Conduct interventions with clients.
13. Conduct evaluations of client progress.

Paired Differences t df Sig. (2-tailed)

Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean 95% Confidence Interval of the Difference

Lower Upper

PreQ1 - PostQ1 -1.13208 1.09610 .10646 -1.34317 -.92098 -10.634 105 .000

PreQ2 - PostQ2 -.79048 1.00666 .09824 -.98529 -.59566 -8.046 104 .000

PreQ3 - PostQ3 -.61682 1.05191 .10169 -.81844 -.41521 -6.066 106 .000

PreQ4 - PostQ4 -.68224 .99620 .09631 -.87318 -.49131 -7.084 106 .000

PreQ5 - PostQ5 -.79439 1.03467 .10002 -.99270 -.59608 -7.942 106 .000

PreQ6 - PostQ6 -1.16822 1.18549 .11461 -1.39544 -.94101 -10.193 106 .000

PreQ7 - PostQ7 -.78505 1.09051 .10542 -.99406 -.57603 -7.447 106 .000

PreQ8 - PostQ8 -1.22642 1.04456 .10146 -1.42758 -1.02525 -12.088 105 .000

PreQ9 - PostQ9 -1.12264 1.08411 .10530 -1.33143 -.91386 -10.662 105 .000

PreQ10 - PostQ10 -1.07619 4.20781 .41064 -1.89051 -.26188 -2.621 104 .010

PreQ11 - PostQ11 -1.52381 1.30159 .12702 -1.77570 -1.27192 -11.996 104 .000

PreQ12 - PostQ12 -1.50962 1.32192 .12963 -1.76670 -1.25253 -11.646 103 .000

PreQ13 - PostQ13 -1.43269 1.23669 .12127 -1.67320 -1.19219 -11.814 103 .000

 “Professional SW and conduct myself accordingly: I take this very
seriously. I do feel that the ORC visits allowed me to improve
professionalism. Conduct assessments: I definitely feel that I
have improved due to the ORC visits. I experienced 3 different
visits in which I had to have a conversation (assess) with workers.
This required me to be flexible and open-minded when asking
particular question, e.g. open vs. closed-ended. “

 “Diversity-just being able to work with a group of people who are
not the same as me. Engagement- I feel a lot more comfortable
talking to clients I do not know. “

 “Throughout this past semester at ORC I feel my evaluation and
assessment skills have really progressed. Through talking with our
ORC clients I have really felt like I have grown in these areas.
ORC provided great life like interviewing situations that I feel will
translate into a social work career. “

 “Engagements and Assessment- I think that I am still
developing skills to be interactive and engage with the
client population, out of my own fear of, or more feeling
unprepared to effectively help others. I think initially
visiting the ORC was a huge step out of my comfort zone,
however with practically being forced to go to the ORC
definitely helped guide me in the right direction.”

 “Applying social work ethical practices. I feel as if I have a
lot to learn about ethical practices. Critical thinking, I feel
as if I have to practice those social work skills more in
setting like ORC. It is a good start for me!”

 “I am a little worried about all the ethical obligations
social workers must incorporate in the field. Luckily, I feel
that I will learn as I go and as long as I keep an open mind
that I’ll be fine. ”

 In an exhaustive review of the social work
literature on using service learning, Lemieux
and Allen (2007) found that that there was a
poor conceptualization of service learning
within the discipline.
 Service learning is not:
 Volunteer work
 Internships (parctica)

 We use Bringle and Hatcher’s (1996)
definition of service learning:
 We view service learning as credit bearing
educational experience in which students
participate in an organized service activity, that
meets identified community needs and reflect on
the service activity in such a way as to gain
further understanding of the course content a
broader appreciation of the discipline and an
enhanced sense of service responsibility (p. 222).

 Service
learning places equal emphasis on
three outcomes:
 Student learning
 Service to the community
 The development of mutually respectful
relationships between students and the
communities in which they are engaged
(Lemieux and Allen, 2007)

 Servicelearning has the potential to address
several faculty concerns:
 Lack of interest in macro social work courses
such as policy, community and organizational
practice, and research.
 Students tolerate rather than integrate content
into practice.
 Access to diverse populations.
(Sather, Weitz,& Carlson, 2007)

 Benefits student learning
 Critical thinking
 Problem solving
 Academic learning
 Personal and moral development
 leadership
 Social responsibility
 cultural understanding
 commitment to service
 satisfaction with college
 Increased feeling of competence
(Lemieux and Allen, 2007)

 Social Work Practice with Individuals:
 Community education project
 Social Work Practice with Communities:
 Various projects
 Social Work Research:
 Various community projects
 Social Work Policy Analysis:
 Election judge project
 Multicultural Issues:
 Refugee resettlement project

Use learningstyles&communitiesofpracticeinclassroom.winona

 Multicultural Issues (SOCW 355) and
Community Organizing (SOCW 415) classes
represent an intentional and strategic
partnership between WSU and Community
Partners. Through collaborative initiatives,
the two classes provide opportunities for
students to bridge their own learning and
living experiences.
 The classes promote students participation in
forms of active learning that extend beyond
the traditional classroom.

 The course introduces students to a life-long
learning process in the development of cultural
competent social work practice
 Multicultural Issues class has been devoted to
engaged-learning strategy in which all of the
class objectives are learned by working on
projects with Catholic Charities Refuges
Resettlement Program
 Students put classroom skills and knowledge into
practice while serving refugees and the
community.
 The educational skill is to combine civic
involvement with academic coursework in a way
that benefits both the students and
refugee/community

 Student are well informed about the course and
partnership with Catholic Charities Refugee
Resettlement Program.
 (a) A speaker from Catholic Charities attends and
participates in our first and second class
 (b) Students participate into two events
organized by Catholic Charities for raising
awareness
 (c) Students participates in two literacy classes
with refugees
 (d) Students participate in other activities e.g
assisting refugees to attend appointments,
applying for jobs, finding resources and during
the citizen day etc.

 Students are challenged to create, complete
and present a creative service learning
project. A service learning project should
reflect significant on-site community
involvement intentionally linked to the
course content.
 The service is for the purpose of community
engagement, learning and experience is
mutually beneficial to community partners
and students.

 “We as a group brain stormed different ideas and then
finally came up with the idea of a garage sale. The idea of
a garage sale was perfect because it not only included the
community but gave us an opportunity to educate the
school and community about Catholic Charities Refugee
Resettlement Program.”
 “Educating the community and the school as a whole
was one of the most important things that Catholic
Charities wanted us to do. This whole experience was
challenging, moving and inspirational. I knew that we could
hold this garage sale and educate people at the same time, but
this was a huge success because we did raise over $800.”

Providing Services:
“My group was in charge of the garage sale held at
RCTC on Friday, April 23. Overall, I think this was a
great project. We were successful in creating
awareness in our community, raising money for the
program, and donating the leftover merchandise to
the Salvation Army.”

 Welcome Baskets: “By being assigned this project not
only did I learn things regarding a population that I
really didn’t know that much about, I was also able to
give to others through this project. I feel that giving to
others our time and resources makes us grow as a
person. I chose to do the welcome baskets because I
liked the idea of welcoming others into our community
especially those who have already suffered harshly, the
idea of bringing a little comfort to others was appealing
to me. I can only imagine what things would be like if
all members of society practiced random acts of
kindness on a regular basis.”

 “THE GARAGE SALE”! “I had a great opportunity to grow and
work together to make this even huge. We had advertised and
collected donations from anyone who would listen to this story of
need. I have to say, this education was equally as important to
those who attended the event as it was for us. We had learned
already that there was a need and we committed ourselves to work
as hard as we could to help this need. However, more importantly,
we were able to educate and open people’s eyes to a community of
refugees. Most people have a hard time understanding that
immigrants are not all illegal. I myself was able to advocate for a
change in thinking and better understanding. To me, that was the
greatest gift.”

 This class is organized in a way that engaged-learning provides an
arena where students work in a professional capacity with
community organizations, their peers and the instructor of the
course.
 Through the course, students in groups of five to seven are
challenged to identify a community need and a community partner
to address the need
 The students are actively involved with a community partner and
the community involved with students.
 Through community –engaged learning (experiential learning)
students are able to integrate hands-on practice and thoughtful
reflections. Through active engagement with local communities,
we try to build an increasingly inclusive and supportive community
at WSU
 Student benefit by getting experience and academic credits, while
the community benefits in form of services, materials and money.

 Neighborhood Watch: The neighborhood of First
Avenue North-East in Rochester, Minnesota -
partnership with Rochester Police & NE community
 Beyond the Yellow Ribbon is a comprehensive program
that creates awareness for the purpose of connecting
Service members and their families with community
support
 Helping families and individuals in need – partnership with
the Salvation Army
 Domestic violence. Women’s shelter – partnership with the
Transition House
 Environmental : Reuse to Reduce & Hammond
Community Clean-Up Projects
 Homelessness – partnership with Salvation Army

 “Communities of practice are groups of
people who share a concern or a passion for
something they do and learn how to do it
better as they interact regularly.”
(Wenger, 1998, p.4)

 Domain: Content to be learned
 Course content or course objectives
 Community: People involved
 Students, instructor, and service learning
partners
 Practice: Specific activities
 Classroom exercises, discussion, course
assignments, community projects

 The community needs the flexibility to evolve in
it’s interests
 Willingness to re-negotiate course objectives,
assignments, schedule etc.
 Opportunities for open dialog within and with
outside perspectives
 Interaction among class members
 Interaction with community partners
 Focus on the value of the community –
 Create opportunities for students to explicitly discuss
the value and productivity of class and projects
(Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, 2002)

 Consist of both public and private community
spaces.
 Public spaces are where all group members can
interact.
 Private spaces are where small groups of people
interact


 Combine familiarity and excitement –
 Students should receive the expected learning as
part of the course and have opportunities to
shape their learning experience together.


 Explain what a community of practice is and the
benefits of using it in the classroom (sell it
upfront).
 Ask students what they want to learn and hold
them accountable for learning it.
 Model the behaviors you want them to use.
 Provide class time for reflection, analysis.
 Be willing to lead and be willing to follow.

 Learning from multiple points of view
 “Using a community of practice model offers a variety of
people to learn from, instead of just the instructor.
Students are able to use each other’s experiences and
knowledge to strengthen our own knowledge base.”
 Learning from modeling
 “Communities of practice allow us to watch the
different styles and techniques of our peers and learn
from those observations.”
 Keeping students engaged
 “In a community of practice model, all students have
something to offer the learning environment, which
makes for a more active and engaged classroom
setting.”

 In groups based on your strongest MI
 Choose a learning objective (either from a
current course or create one)
 Create an engaged learning activity for the
learning objective utilizing your group’s MI
 How can you incorporate “Community of
Practice” into this engaged learning activity?

The groups will report on their activity.

 Write down two things that you learned from
this session that you will take back with you
to your classrooms?

 Armstrong’s learning styles to help us adopt
our teaching to student learning preferences.
 CoP to create a classroom/learning culture
where students are engaged in the content.
 Service learning projects to make the course
content tangible and come alive.

 Armstrong, T. (2000). Multiple intelligences in the classroom. (2nd
ed.). Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
 Bringle, R.G., & Hatcher, J. A. (1996). Implementing service learning
in higher education. Journal of Higher Education, 67, 221-
239.
 Gardner, H. (1993). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple
intelligence. (2nd ed.). New York, NY: BasicBooks.
 Lemieux, C., M., and Allen, P., D. (2007). Service learning in social
work education: The state of knowledge, pedagogical
practicalities and practice conundrums. Journal of Social Work
Education, 43(2), 309-325.
 Sather, P., Weitz, B., Carlson, P. (2007). Engaging students in macro
issues through community based learning: The policy,
practice and research sequence. Journal of Teaching in Social
Work. 27(3/4), 62-79.
 Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and
identity. New York: Cambridge University Press.
 Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating
communities of practice: A guide to managing knowledge.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

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