Hi,

How about this paper:

The Effect of Switching the Order of Experimental Teaching in the Study of Simple Gravity Pendulum - Study with Junior High-school Learners

By:Tsihouridis, CA (Tsihouridis, Charilaos A.)[ 1 ] ; Vavougios, D (Vavougios, Dennis)[ 1 ] ; Ioannidis, GS (Ioannidis, George S.)[ 2 ]

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES IN LEARNING

Volume: 12

Issue: 3

Pages: 128-141

Some courses are foundational or core courses which must be taught first before students can attempt more advanced ones. At other times, courses are dual having two parts theory and practice so they must be taught in the same semester. This type of sequencing allows for better learning performance.

Many thanks,

Debra

The order of subjects taught indeed have a toll on the learning outcomes. The often simpler, foundational courses always cushion students for the building blocks that are often complex, requiring great analytical skills.

Thanks folks, need papers and articles in journals or conference to reference it.

Dear Avishag, would you have a copy of this paper?

Hi Rodrigo,

This article is a golden Open Access paper, available from the publisher with no charge.You could open the journal's site and download the paper.

It depends of the level I suppose. Is it preschool, school children or tertiary level? I am guessing not preschool if you plan to teach students how to run before they learn how to walk:-)

It's just a metaphore. But I m studing undergraduates.

This is a good question. However, the order of subjects taught will vary depending on the stage of learning and students' prior knowledge and the objectives/outcomes of what you teach.

I think the general principles here are:

1. Are you using an integrated curriculum or a discipline-based curriculum?

2. What do the students' already know, and which of these subjects fit most of what you want to introduce them to the next step?

3. What are the outcomes of the program, what are the outcomes of each stage in the program, where does the subject you plan to introduce fit most?

4. Did you test the students' readiness? and the students' learning needs?

5. What do other curricula have? What are their justifications? are there specific reasons for your curriculum to be designed differently? justify your views.

6. What do the stakeholders of the curriculum think? Who are your stalk holders? involve them in the answer?

7. Which of these subjects could help in facilitating the understanding of the next subject? list some examples, not just one?

8. Introduce, test, observe, research and see if what you have introduced is working or you need to make changes next year. You must have reliable evidence for any variations from students, teachers, assessment, experts and the literature.

I think these are the main rules we use in the curriculum design. Good luck. Prof S Azer

Fundamental courses should be taught first.

Secondly Experienced learning courses and then lastly Professional knowledge courses.

I think the most important thing in learning is to always consider that you are forming people. Teaching is a factor of impact in the education of others

Thank you Professor Azer for your elaborated commentary.

I like the question.Indeed the order of the subjects is important to link one stage to the other. At the skills acquisition level, learners are more less observing the steps on the checklist while an expert performs and at the skills competence level,they link up the order of performing the skill while an expert now uses the checklist to support the learner also giving constructive feed back.And at the competence level, peer learning and assessment is possible.So the sequence from simpler to complex may be necessary.

Glad you cleared that up for me Rodrigo:)

Some interesting points above

At undergraduate (tertiary education) level, it is expected of the student to go beyond anything taught by any 'sage' or educator.

I started teaching undergrads just when I was about to finish my nurse education course, during which we learnt about gestalt and problem solving. To cut a long story short, I ended up creating a Problem Based Learning (PBL) module in the first year of the programme after attending a workshop at McMaster uni in Canada.

This module treated the content of A&P, pathophysiology and related nursing care. So essentially we were using a step process; with students being presented with a problem about nursing care. So to use your metaphor, the students were being encouraged to learn (subtle difference from teaching or 'ingesting knowledge' into students) how to walk and run; or perhaps jog, because they needed help to solve the allocated tasks to solve the problems encountered in a clinical setting.

The aim was twofold, to help students learn how to resolve problems (a basic life skill) and practice humboldtian skills. There was only one but major hurdle; the PBL approach was a one off for the whole curriculum.

Fast forward a decade and I went into elearning. My case study research highlighted how technology enhanced learning is so similar in PBL in various ways, not least in that the academics fell into two categories, innovators and adaptors. Nonetheless they all were helping students to jog along by vetting the open resources found by students and help students construct learning together (based on, Bruner, Dewey, Vygotsky - and Illich perhpas?)

Google scholar articles on this can be found:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=constructive+learning+theory&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwigjZTliOnaAhUFWxQKHStxCkcQgQMIITAA

And you should have no problem to find learning theories being linked to psychology; since the majority are. Whether that is a good thing or not is debatable. The only concern I have is that since the psychologists were looking at preschool and school children, their slant would be based on pedagogical theories, not androgogical theories, which should be considered for tertiary education.

Thank you folks!