Cheryl Lemke, CEO and President of Metiri Group, a consulting firm dedicated to advancing technology in schools presented to a full house of educators, technology coordinators and other educational technology professionals at this week’s National Education Computing Conference (NECC) held in San Antonio, Texas. In her session, The Ripple Effect: 21st Century Innovations That Matter, Lemke asserts that constructivist, high technology approaches to learning greatly influence students abilities toward deeper understanding of content and challenged audience members to become agents of change in our schools. Lemke pointed to John Bransford’s work through learning by design, creating authentic learning experiences within greater context as opposed to learning in discrete parts without grounding information in purpose and meaning.

Identifying real situations that require students to solve problems for an invested “client” is an ideal method of teaching in this manner. As an example, Lemke noted Telannia Norfar, a math teacher with an interesting approach to teaching demonstrated on her Logic Inc. blog. Students look at data using algebraic equations to determine which cell phone provider is the most cost effective. Through data analysis, students come up with a business proposal on how to improve the quality and cost of food in the school cafeteria. These examples show how teachers and students can identify real-life situations that provide a context for learning that is both authentic and meaningful.

Key to this approach is bearing in mind what brain-based learning teaches us about how people process information in “chunks” and the need for scaffolding information so as not to overload the learner. Scaffolding is a process of building knowledge, guiding the learner into greater understanding and context. This process also helps students become self-directed learners. Lemke used the example of a guided inquiry activity to determine whether a sweater or aluminum foil keeps a soda can cooler over time (my mother would debate the use of aluminum foil as the most effective way, but students investigating this may find otherwise!)

Lemke states that providing authentic learning experiences for students correlate with higher test scores due to the deeper contextual meaning they provide through “learning with understanding”, an idea not held by all in the educational community.

Lemke then discussed the “culture of collaboration” and the need for more collaborative learning environments to enhance students’ abilities to address concepts involving more complex thinking as the research would suggest. Innovations in other fields can teach educators ways to infuse more collaborative strategies in teaching. In the business world, for example, businesses such as Cisco and Best Buy have created online social networks of support with customers helping other customers out with technical problems and the Best Buy “blue shirt” support network.

2.0 technologies lend themselves to collaborative environments where students can create networks for sharing and distributing information, but bearing Lemke’s emphasis on constructivist approaches, educators must think of creative ways of addressing content in authentic contexts.