Physics educators may or may not be interested in a recent post "Re:
Do Limitations of Working Memory Make "Direct Instruction" Effective
or Ineffective? #2" [Hake (2007)]. The abstract reads:
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ABSTRACT: In response to my post "Do Limitations of Working Memory
Make 'Direct Instruction' Effective or Ineffective?," an IFETS
subscriber stated that the question is too simplistic because there
are two fundamental observations to account for: (a) some students
learn well from almost any lecture, and (b) some lecturers can
effectively reach a wide audience. I agree with both "a" and "b"
but, in my view, those don't show that the question "Do Limitations
of Working Memory Make "Direct Instruction" Effective or
Ineffective?" is simplistic. The fact remains that Kirschner,
Sweller, & Clark (KSC) argue that limitations of working memory (LWM)
make "direct instruction" (DI) EFFECTIVE, while Carl Wieman (CW)
argues that LWM makes **passive student** lectures [the exemplar of
DI to most physics education researchers (PER's)] INEFFECTIVE. The
paradox is resolved by realizing that KSW and PER's have totally
different definitions of DI. To KSC, DI means instruction which is
substantially guided, therefore similar to what some PER's call
"Interactive Engagement" (IE). To most PER's DI means
**passive-student** lectures.
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REFERENCES
Hake, R.R. 2007. Re: Do Limitations of Working Memory Make "Direct
Instruction" Effective or Ineffective? #2, AERA-L post of 8 Dec 2007
08:02:35-0800;online in the OPEN archives of AERA-L at
<http://tinyurl.com/3bld23>.