You can't beat Lego

This post is to patent yesterday's genius moment, answering the question I posed to myself in October of how to physically demonstrate the differences in learning that take place in a traditional/Blackboard model vs a social/collaborative model. I hereby patent the Piatt-build-a-car-out-of-Lego-to-demonstrate-social-learning model. There.

My willing colleagues were subjected to being my first guinea pigs at lunchtime today. In fact, it was our departmental office christmas lunch, so many thanks to them all for humouring me on what was supposed to be a more alcoholic occassion!

The model goes like this.
Lego = bits of knowledge.
Building something (a car) out of lego = having learned something new

All students come to a new subject with some existing knowledge. This is represented by a small bag of lego bits given to each "student" (I used 7 students today, but could do more if you have enough lego). Some students have a bag of 3 wheels, soome have some flat bits, some have some wheel blocks. All have some relevant knowledge, but none - independently - have enough to make a car.

Part 1 - Blackboard

So we take a few (say 2) of our students to learn using Blackboard. In Blackboard, the students effectively have no voice. So no questions please. The lecturer (me) has decided in advance what materials to present through the learning environment. Both students are given a bag of bits to make the car the lecturer has designed. 4 wheels, 2 blocks and a base. They can of course bring their existing knowledge to the task, but they don't really need those bits. You can predict the outcome - both students will make the car I intended for them to make.

Predictable learning outcome. Low risk.

Part 2 - Social

The remaining 5 students are then told to work as groups to make a car. Everyone has a voice. At this point, I, as lecturer become one voice amongst many as they raid their bags and start seeing who has which wheels and *sharing* with each other. I as lecturer can choose to answer questions, provide any extra bits I feel they need as required. The cars they make are unpredictable, and rather mad - wheels aren't balanced, dubious extra bits everywhere. This (I hope) demonstrates something much richer than above. There are loads of learning opportunities here to talk about how and why things work.

It could be argued that students who've been through the basics using Blackboard are better enabled to make use of the richness that comes out of the social, having a good grounding for what they're entering into.

I'll be giving this model it's first official outing at the Durham users conference in January, so will report how well this works with a larger group then.