The learner's mindset is defined as "a state of being where people act on their intrinsic capacity to learn and respond to their inquisitive nature that leads to viewing all interactions with the world as learning opportunities (Learner's Mindset, 2021)." Having come into the Applied Digital Learning program in only my last two courses of my master's after starting in Digital Learning and Leading, I didn't know that much about the actual learner's mindset until this final class. After doing some reading and video watching, I've come to realize that the whole goal of the DLL and ADL programs was to get those of us that were participating to be in a learner's mindset.
A learner's mindset is something that every being is born with. When we're young, we're trying to learn all we can and want to know what everything is and does. I'll admit to being a little annoyed by the constant questions of my nephew and niece as they ask what seems to be a million questions about why things are the way they are. Listening to more information about the learner's mindset though makes me wish that older kids still did this. Our school system has totally squashed the natural desire of kids to learn by making everything "one size fits all" and standardized testing them along the way.
How can we get that learner's mindset back? Is it gone for good? Thank goodness that there are ways to get it back. Dr. Harapnuik (Learner's Mindset, 2021) gives us three ways to try to revitalize the learner's mindset in ourselves and our students.
Change in Thinking about Learning - We need to know why we're doing what we're doing. This is why we had to come up with our own why, what and how for our innovation so that we'd know what our focus was all about. We had to engage our passion for the project so that we could get started. We were able to keep it going by adopting a growth mindset so that setbacks were only temporary because we would take the feedback we received to make it better in the future.
Change in the Approach of Learning How to Learn - This where COVA comes in. To get back into learner's mindset, we need to be able to have choice, ownership and voice available to our students as they learn through authentic experiences. In the DLL/ADL program, we were fully immersed into COVA. We had the ability to choose what our innovation would be. This gave us full ownership of our ideas especially when we used our ePortfolios to voice our ideas to others.
Change in the Learning Environment - A typical classroom is where students are sitting in their desk passively getting the information from the teacher. To reignite learning, we need to make it more engaging and significant to our students. Teachers need to step back from the center ring of the circus, and become more of a mentor that encourages their learners to be owners of their own learning. Creating a significant learning environment (CSLE) may feel uncomfortable to all parties involved due to it not being the norm, but it opens up so many possibilities for deeper conversations and learning.
All three of these changes were part of the DLL/ADL program. We had to determine why we wanted to do what we decided on for our innovation. We adopted a growth mindset and took feedback on all aspects of our plans and used it as feed forward to make necessary changes for the better. From day one, this program immersed us into a significant learning environment where we had to do the learning for ourselves. There were a few guiding moments from the professors, but for the most part, it was all on us. I have learned a lot about myself in this program, and I hope to now pass it on to my students and colleagues.
Reference:
Learner's Mindset. (2021, February 5). Learner's mindset explained [Video]. YouTube.
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