{"id":161,"date":"2021-02-21T16:20:31","date_gmt":"2021-02-21T16:20:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.ac.uk\/kierg\/?p=161"},"modified":"2021-02-23T15:00:11","modified_gmt":"2021-02-23T15:00:11","slug":"driving-learners-to-abstraction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.ac.uk\/kierg\/2021\/02\/21\/driving-learners-to-abstraction\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Driving learners to abstraction\u2019 – KERU turns 11"},"content":{"rendered":"

Author:<\/strong>\u00a0Dr. Graham McPhail, University of Auckland, New Zealand (g.mcphail@auckland.ac.nz\u00a0 @gjmcpauck)<\/em><\/p>\n

A small group of academics at the bottom of the world in Aotearoa New Zealand have been beavering away for 11 years concerned with the idea of what knowledge counts in education. This issue of what knowledge should be taught in educational institutions has become a key research programme internationally among realist sociologists of education and the purpose of the Knowledge in Education Research Unit (KERU)<\/a> is to ensure New Zealand\u2019s involvement in this programme. Our aim is to provide research for policymakers and teachers in order to strengthen the argument for the place of disciplinary-derived knowledge in the curriculum. Our argument is that students from all socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds should have access to the type of knowledge that leads to success at school (e.g. McPhail & Rata, 2019). KERU is committed to improving educational results for M\u0101ori and Pacific students and children from low socio-economic communities.<\/p>\n

We have been a productive unit with our leader Professor Elizabeth Rata and myself publishing regularly and widely (see here<\/a>). Established in 2010, KERU is based in the School of Critical Studies, Faculty of Education and Social Work at the University of Auckland<\/a> but includes researchers from across the Faculty. Our theoretical approach is derived from Durkeimian and Bernsteinian traditions using realist methodological approaches (Lourie & Rata, 2017; McPhail & Lourie, 2017; Rata, 2014) . The focus is on types of knowledge in the curriculum and the connection between curriculum design and progressive pedagogies. In addition to promoting research-based educational interventions, KERU provides a vehicle for postgraduate students and contributes to research at the University of Auckland.<\/p>\n

We have had a particularly fruitful collaboration exploring knowledge-based approaches to the curriculum and learning with Dr Richard Pountney, Principal Lecturer and Teaching Fellow at the Sheffield Institute of Education (SIOE)<\/a>, Sheffield Hallam University. Since 2015 the two universities have built a sound research collaboration through ongoing knowledge exchange activities. These include symposia by Richard Pountney (SIOE) in Auckland and by KERU\u2019s Graham McPhail and Elizabeth Rata in Sheffield. The co-authored papers and co-research projects in United Kingdom and New Zealand schools have been generative (Pountney & McPhail, 2017, 2019) and have contributed to the model for teacher professional development (see below) which is being used with pre-service and practising teachers in New Zealand and in England by Di Swift at the Keele and North Staffordshire Teacher Education (KNSTE)<\/a> unit.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Our most recent work has been centred on the Curriculum Design Coherence Model<\/strong> (CDC Model) and Richard Pountney\u2019s humorous and pithy phrase \u2018driving my students to abstraction\u2019 (see blogpost Waving not Drowning<\/a>)\u00a0 sums up the essence of the Model. Abstraction lies at the heart of creative thinking and deep learning and so\u00a0 is central to the model. We argue the development of abstract thought comes from using disciplinary-derived concepts, so concepts rather than content should be the starting point for curriculum design (download CDC Model Short Outline Feb 2021<\/a>)<\/p>\n

The CDC Model aims for deep learning by placing disciplinary-derived concepts (or subject concepts for short) at the center of the design process. Subject concepts are identified by \u2018surfacing\u2019 the epistemic structure of a lesson, topic, or learning programme. Sufficiently abstract subject concepts are powerful tools for learning because of their generalisability. The subject concepts also act as cohering mechanisms as conceptual and applied knowledge are brought together by being linked to subject content. The Model is designed as a series of four sequential Elements but the design process is iterative, a movement back and forth between (i) selecting and sequencing subject concepts, (ii) connecting subject concepts to content, (iii) connecting \u2018knowledge-that\u2019 (concepts and content) to \u2018know-how-to\u2019 (applied knowledge) and finally (iv) evaluating the knowledge-that and know-how-to. The essence of the lesson, topic, or programme is encapsulated in a proposition that claims what the nature of the relationship is between the topic and the key concepts (see my video Curriculum Design for Deep Learning<\/a>)<\/p>\n