Model 1:

"Disseminating Knowledge"

Model 2:

"Making learning Possible"

Epistemological

assumptions

• Knowledge exists separately from the people who possess it.
• Knowledge can be conveyed.
• Concepts and facts are prerequisites for problem solving in a field of study.
  Theory and practice are separate domains.

• Knowledge doesn’t exist apart from people
• Knowledge must be reconstructed by learners
• Facts and concepts are learned as they are used
• Problem-solving, concepts and facts are mutually dependent, in learning as well as in expert practice

Academic and social environment

Of little importance:

• Knowledge is created through a social system but is learned through individual study and practice.
• Other students provide competition, but are otherwise marginal for learning

Of central significance:

• Effective learning occurs in an environment that mimics social systems of inquiry.
• Social interaction and cooperation are essential to the negotiation of understanding.

Student learning

Teacher focused

• Practise procedures, produce correct answers, reproduce knowledge accurately.
• Infer methods of inquiry from knowledge organisation and texts

Learner focused

• Responsibly regulate inquiry
• Construct personal understanding
• Emulate experts’ methods
• Abstract concepts and principles from experience.

Teacher’s role

• Ensure that ever expanding content is covered
• Organise and present knowledge well
• Arrange suitable teaching activities, including lectures, tutorials and labs as appropriate.
• Rely on students to understand and absorb presented knowledge and procedures

• Limit the content to essentials
• Model the methods of practice and scholarship in the field
• Design diverse tasks strongly related to learning goals
• Challenge misconceptions and build understanding through dialogue
• Constantly monitor student understanding and intervene whenever necessary.

Desirable learning and assessment tasks

• Well structured problems and standard exercises with high reliability.
• "Decontextualised practice": parts are studied separately and only brought together towards the end of the course.
• Tasks provide feedback at end of unit or not at all

• Loosely structured problems and realistic tasks requiring student decision making.
• "Situated practice": tasks of increasing complexity that incorporate essential skills and knowledge.
• Tasks provide continuous feedback.

How is teaching improved?

• Mainly through practice, driven by external rewards

• Mainly through repeated cycles of reflection and action, driven by intrinsic rewards

Approach to management and leadership

Essentially transactional.

• Assigning tasks and rewarding their successful completion.

Essentially transformational

• Creating an enabling environment and pursuing a moral vision