Abstract is better than concrete for transfer, according to the New York Times reporting of recent research in mathematics:

In the experiment, the college students learned a simple but unfamiliar mathematical system, essentially a set of rules. Some learned the system through purely abstract symbols, and others learned it through concrete examples like combining liquids in measuring cups and tennis balls in a container.

Then the students were tested on a different situation — what they were told was a children’s game — that used the same math. “We told students you can use the knowledge you just acquired to figure out these rules of the game,” Dr. Kaminski said.

The students who learned the math abstractly did well with figuring out the rules of the game. Those who had learned through examples using measuring cups or tennis balls performed little better than might be expected if they were simply guessing. Students who were presented the abstract symbols after the concrete examples did better than those who learned only through cups or balls, but not as well as those who learned only the abstract symbols.

The problem with the real-world examples, Dr. Kaminski said, was that they obscured the underlying math, and students were not able to transfer their knowledge to new problems.

“They tend to remember the superficial, the two trains passing in the night,” Dr. Kaminski said. “It’s really a problem of our attention getting pulled to superficial information.”

The explanation of examples clouding up the concepts reminds me somewhat of the research on reading about seductive details diminishing recall of information. (There are many articles on this phenomenon, but see, for example, Processing and recall of seductive details in scientific text.)

Transfer is also a major problem in writing: Students often don't transfer what they know about writing in one situation to new situations. Somehow, the situations are compartmentalized so that the concepts don't transfer, which remains me of the research on students learning physics. David Hammer's research showed that students could compartmentalize and keep their every day notions about motion from the physics concepts they were learning.

So, although this was a small study (and one that needs to be replicated), it does fit in with what we know of transfer, that learning that is bound to a particular context doesn't transfer well--which explains why students who have learned the five-paragraph essay structure in high school continue to use it in college even when an assignment requires them not to.

What would be the abstract set of rules for writing? I've looked at that before, except I called them "building blocks." But although I can see the need for knowing the building blocks abstractly, I think mastering them abstractly is achieved through much practice of remixing these building blocks across contexts. (See Learning by Remixing and also this review/synopsis of Spiro's Cognitive Flexibility Theory.)

The problem remains determining what those building blocks are. Although they likely differ across genre (just as math concepts differ from geometry to algebra to calculus and so on), they must also have elements in common. At a basic level, there's always writer, audience, text, and purpose. For persuasion, it may come down to the formula in Graff and Birkenstein's book "They Say / I Say", in which writers join into a conversation with others and position themselves with respect to those others. It's a small book with three parts and ten chapters:

Part 1. "They say"

ONE: "They say" (Starting with What Others Are Saying)

TWO: "Her Point Is" (The Art of Summarizing)

THREE: "As He Himself Puts It" (The Art of Quoting)

Part 2. "I Say"

FOUR: "Yes / No / Okay, But" (Three Ways to Respond)

FIVE: "And Yet" (Distinguishing What You Say from What They Say)

SIX: "Skeptics May Object" (Planting a Naysayer in Your Text)

SEVEN: "So What? Who Cares?" (Saying Why It Matters)

Part 3: Tying It All Together

EIGHT: "As a Result" (Connecting the Parts)

NINE: "Ain't So / Is Not" (Academic Writing Doesn't Mean Setting Aside Your Own Voice)

TEN: "In Other Words" (The Art of Metacommentary)

As you can see, despite having only two building blocks--"they say" and "I say"--students are led into a variety of ways of analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating what "they say," along with generating their own understanding and position among others in a conversation. And treating persuasive writing like a conversation has many connections to students' lives: They argue about their sports, clothes, cars, majors, professors, and so on.

I imagine that different sets of building blocks are possible, just as different sets of rules can be found in different fields of math. The key seems to be helping students practice using one coherent set of building blocks (i.e., abstract principles) across contexts.

Related posts:
The Five-Paragraph Essay and Building Blocks of Writing
The Five-Paragraph Essay (continued)
Learning by Remixing

For those interested in getting a better understanding of how learning occurs, see the following websites:

Explorations into Learning and Instruction: The Theory into Practice Database. Maintained by Greg Kearsley, it's quite useful for brief introductions into learning theories, domains, and concepts.

EmTech has "over 15,000 resources organized by topics for teachers, students, and parents" with this page of links to learning theories.

See also Kathy Sierra's Crash Course in Learning Theory.

Yesterday, Dina Rosen and I presented at a conference on Pedagogy across Disciplines: Imagining and Delivering the Possibilities. We looked at the use of blogs, wikis, and google docs for promoting interaction among students and among instructors.

Participants had quite a few questions. One asked how what we were doing was any different from Dewey approaches to educcation. We responded that the approaches aren't different, but that these online tools support experiential learning in ways that may be more difficult without them. For instance,

• These tools allow students ways to interact without having to meet physically, a key factor for commuter and working students.
• They create real audiences, thus giving an authentic purpose that motivates students.
• They can engage students more, thus ending up with them spending more time on task, the main factor in learning.
• And so on.

As one participant noted, however, it's not about the tools: It's about learning. Thus, as we use these tools, or others, we need to ask ourselves:

• What's my purpose? That is, what do I want myself and my students to accomplish and why?
• What's my strategy for accomplishing that purpose?
• What's my strategy for integrating factors of learning, motivating, and interacting with ideas?

Although none of this is new for those already engaged with such learning tools, it is new for the majority who aren't. And they are interested in learning about these tools, and they ask good questions about using them. It's just a matter of time for integrating them in learning-oriented ways in their own instruction.

On a sidenote, I like putting my presentations online. I generally leave them up for a while so participants can return and click on the links, plus email me if they have additional questions. If you have a Mac, Sandvox is a great way to put up websites (and presentations) quickly. All you need to do is fill in the content. The program takes care of the design. I used it for my "Why I don't have comments" page, along with "E-Learning", "Second Language Writing", "Kean University Writing Project", and others. You can see others who have used it for their main websites at Sandvoxed. For those who want to simplify their website life, this is one way to do it.

TESOL 2008 is this week, April 2-5. If you're interested in meeting some of the well-known names in L2 writing and asking them questions on hot topics, Second Language Writing Interest Section (SLWIS) is hosting an evening with them (For a larger view, click here).

If you'd like to learn more about the Second Language Writing Interest Section Community or participate more fully in its activities, be sure to attend our open business meeting Thursday (Sheraton Madison Suite 3, 5:00 pm) and drop by our booth in the exhibition area.

Also, here are the sessions sponsored by the SLWIS (For a larger view, click here):

Home Schooling Debate
Stephen Downes wrote a brief note on his opposition to home schooling and has received quite a bit of flak about it, both in the comments to his post and elsewhere. I asked,

Can you expand on your position and provide some evidence for your claims?

He then made a 16-minute video On Home Schooling to detail his position and make it clearer, but although his position is clear, he doesn't seem to have any evidence for his opinions.

In a later note, he wrote of those writing elsewhere that the post by Dana Hanley was "the most constructive," and it is fairly thorough. Stephen plans to follow up with a more detailed response later, so let's see what evidence he has then.

Using Videos
On another note, his video made it clear to me that when using tools, we need to consider what they have to offer, how they can add to our message, and what we lose when using them. Videos can do things that mere talking cannot. Just consider MIchael Wesch's video, Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us. It would be impossible to get across the same meaning compressed into this video into a print-only text (unless perhaps it were book-length). A print-only text could only write about the meaning while this video shows the meaning while texting about it.

In contrast to Wesch's video, Stephen's video added nothing to the meaning that could not have been accomplished in a text-only medium. In fact, it accomplished less for three reasons:

1. With print, I can easily cast my eyes up and down (scrolling if necessary) to clarify and confirm the meaning, while with a video I have to stop it and replay it if I miss or don't understand something.
2. With video, I need to take notes to be able to see the whole picture while reviewing and reflecting on it instead of being limited to a sequential input of ideas.
3. Videos require more time for listening than print for reading.

All three reasons involve time. This time requirement of viewing and understanding videos means that if they are to be used, they need to offer something that cannot be obtained in print only, something that is worth the extra time investment, such as using talking videos or podcasts with language learners who need the extra aural practice.

The 42nd Annual TESOL Conference (2008) is coming up soon, April 2-5, in New York City. Thursday afternoon, I'll be presenting along with three others on assessing writing . If you're coming to the conference and interested in assessing writing, here's a breakdown of what we'll be talking about.

Self-assessment
I'll be looking at how to help students in higher education learn to evaluate their writing, reflect on their writing, and take appropriate measures to improve their writing by

• embedding assessment in the course objectives,
• providing transparency in evaluative criteria, and
• considering both product and process.

Basically, having students use the instructor's criteria for assessment gets them thinking in those terms, seeing more clearly course expectations, and hopefully giving them an understanding of assessment they can take with them after leaving our classrooms.

Multi-trait rubrics
Tim Grove will review a multi-trait rubric that assesses basic academic writing skills of incoming international graduate students in an MA TESOL program. Based on previous years’ assessment results, the rubric focuses on select component skills of academic writing (ability to comprehend the prompt, development of the argument, organization, grammar skills) instead of overall academic writing proficiency.

Techniques of assessment
John Liang provides a survey of techniques used to assess writing, including methods that minimize grading time, while remaining valid and reliable. He will examine rubrics, general comment sheets, error counting, error classification, personalized grading plans, Grade Negotiation, and even Rapaport’s “Triage Theory of Grading.”

Online and holistic assessment
Tim Collins will review strengths and weaknesses of online and holistic assessment of writing, now frequently used on high-stakes assessments, and provide ideas on how instructors can prepare learners for success on these assessments.

In all of these, we make certain assumptions. Assessment

• should reflect objectives,
• be transparent to students,
• be fair and effective,
• provide feedback to students and teachers, and
• enable learners to self-assess and take responsibility for their learning.