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What are the conditions that promote excellence in learning? What can educators and parents do to ensure that students will learn to become excellent learners in ways that we value? Both of these questions form the basis of a presentation designed to communicate some of what we have known for some time about the conditions that promote learning and the most exciting new conclusions from current research about what educators and parents can do to promote learning.
Listen to this lecture online » Cultivating a flexible mind: Can you learn how to learn for life? (PDF, 5.6 MB)
First, what I hope will be apparent from this presentation is that we all have the tools to become better learners. It is imperative now to share this information, which has been accumulating in academic journals, with everyday Canadians. Some of the most exciting developments in studies of expert learning and assessment for learning indicate that successful learning involves basic preparation strategies such as deliberate practice, good mentorship, and a cognitive mind set.
Second, while the role of inherited abilities is still influential, there is a great deal of evidence pointing to the control learners have over their learning environments to direct the course of performance and achieve desired goals. By having the ability to control and monitor our effort, performance, feedback, and reflective practices as we learn and even fail, we can increasingly get closer to realizing sought-after outcomes. Traditional ideas about inherited abilities and learning must be updated with modern views about what it takes to develop successful, lifelong attributes related to learning.
My goal is that by the end of this presentation you will experience a new appreciation for how you can influence your own learning and inspire the learning of others around you, especially children, since a mind set for learning can be instilled and cultivated early.
Jacqueline P. Leighton obtained a doctorate in psychology from the University of Alberta in 1999 and thereafter pursued postdoctoral studies in psychology at Yale University. She is Associate Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Alberta and a registered psychologist by the College of Alberta Psychologists. She has co-edited two books published by Cambridge University Press, one on the Nature of Reasoning and another on Cognitive Diagnostic Assessment for Education, in addition to authoring a number of research articles and conference presentations. Her specialization is cognitive-based assessment, in particular the design and validation of educational and psychological testing instruments to measure higher-level thinking and learning skills. Dr. Leighton is a member of the American Educational Research Association, the National Council on Measurement in Education, and the Canadian Society for the Study of Education. Her research has been funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Council of Canada and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.