“In software engineering, a design pattern is a general reusable solution to a commonly occurring problem in software design. ” – Wikipedia. This concept was a huge boon in software development. Object oriented programming was mainstream by that time and provided an incredibly scalable and effective way of building complex software. However, it also providing unlimited possibilities for approaching solving any particular problem leading many to still have to “re-invent wheel” on every project. Design patterns provided light to how to deal with design situations that are common across many different types of applications. In addition, associating well understood names with these situations now gave developers a better way to communicate. When discussing issues, instead of saying we need to “Provide a way to access the elements of an aggregate object sequentially without exposing its underlying representation”, they simply say we need an Iterator, and generally what is needed is understood allow them to move on to the more unique aspects of the task at hand.
Thinking about this concept in relation to how technology is implemented in the curriculum, I wondered: what are some common curriculum design patterns in the application of technology in education that would provide guidance to teachers trying to improve how subjects are taught? Can we provide a common language to the different ways technology can be applied in order to simplify our conversations? Perhaps abstracting things somewhat will give teachers a better way to discuss and improve upon technology in education much the same way developers have been able to do in software design.
Here are a few that I came up with. There are many more I’m sure but think about the ways you see technology applied in the classroom. Can they fall under one of these categories or do they need a pattern of their own?
- Alternative Media for projects / assignments: Using technology to provide students with alternative ways of communicating their knowledge and understanding. Example: Instead of an essay, a short video commercial, a historical radio show, a graphical collage in Photoshop, a blog post.
- Assignment workflow: Using technology for the distribution, creation, submission, marking and returning of assignments.
- Information Front-loading information: using videos, websites, or other engaging media to ensure students enter the class with background in order to make the face-to-face discussion more worthwhile.
- Skill front-loading: Best explained with an example. Titration experiments in Chemistry take a lot of time before, during and after a class. Using titration simulations, students can do many experiments quickly to “get the feel” for the experiment before actually performing the true physical lab. With the prior understanding, they can garner more from the lap experience when they go to do it. A similar example might be using software to experiment with mixing colours before entering an painting class in Art.
- Crowd sourcing knowledge to make topics more relevant / interesting. For example, when discussing social issues, a teacher might leverage the students’ access to SMS on their cell phones or a social network to obtain “real world” statistics relevant to the topic.
- Visualization: Use of technology to allow students to visualize difficult concepts more effectively. Tools like Wordle, Efofex’s FX MathPack, and many others. would fall into this category.
- Providing Context: Using technology to provide better context to what’s being discussed. For example, when discussing Gangis Khan’s conquest in History, Google Earth might be used to give students a better perspective of the regions affected.
In the original “Design Patterns” book, the authors known as the “Gang of Four” outlined 23 patterns in software development. Now there are many more. How many “patterns” are there for applying technology to bettering education?