Source: Adapted from Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1993, and Gee, 2007, as cited in Alcock, 2014.
Figure 2.1: Extended cycle of expertise.
Each new challenging skill sends learners through this cycle. For example, an elementary school student might be given a mathematics problem with fractions. Because the student isn’t familiar with fractions, he or she will have to learn new skills to solve, or master, the problem. Because the student doesn’t yet have the required skills, he or she gets frustrated trying to solve the problem. With help, the student develops the skills he or she needs to solve fractions. Practice by way of repeating and applying the new skills in a carefully scaffolded manner helps the student solidify the required new skills. The student feels positive when he or she masters the skills and can repeatedly solve mathematical fraction problems. The student is willing and ready to try attaining more new skills. This results in the spiraling aspect of the extended cycle of expertise.
The extended cycle of expertise shows that the need for a sense of accomplishment (from positive feelings of mastery) couples with repeated success; it is that coupling that propels the momentum of learning toward the desire for cognitive challenge in a new problem or increased difficulty. The student needs this repeated success. Thus, a combination of appropriate-level challenge, timely feedback, and an observable growth in skill or knowledge creates a deeply satisfying learner experience. This extended cycle of expertise is an active cycle of clear goals (specific new skills) and right-sized (challenging but not impossible), actionable steps (presents specific goals).
Additionally, connecting the skills required to solve fractions to a meaningful quest means the learner is thinking deeply about the skills and concepts. When he or she masters the skills, the student, in effect, is an expert. Then the time is right for an increased challenge, a more difficult version of the fraction problem. When students experience frustration, their level of engagement and need to hit the next level of knowledge help them persevere through the new learning (Haskell, 2012). That tension propels students’ learning.
Goal achievement ceases to be the point for this student. The learner learns how to learn: contending with frustration, having the courage to try, persevering, seeing the immediate results, and figuring out what to do next. The learner also grows an ability to self-regulate (monitoring how one is doing and feeling), self-evaluate (stepping back and judging current work), and self-motivate (setting learning goals and committing to how one will achieve them; Stiggins, 2017). This occurs, in part, through the formative assessment process chapter 8 (page 97) describes.
Questing leverages the extended cycle of expertise by requiring students and teachers to do the following nine steps during the tenet of engagement that invokes an active, intentional cycle.
1. Create and clarify the target (find a new problem or level).
2. Make an initial plan of action (experience frustration).
3. Experiment and try the initial plan (experience frustration).
4. Seek feedback and complete data collection (develop new skills).
5. Reflect by reading and processing the feedback (develop new skills).
6. Change or continue with the plan of action (solidify skills through repetition and closely leveled applications).
7. Change or continue experimenting (experience positive feeling from repeated success).
8. Adjust the target (find a new problem or level that requires new learning).
9. Repeat these steps.
As an example, in elementary schools around the world, students learn about life cycles of butterflies and other living creatures. Through the lens of the active, intentional cycle, that learning might look something like the following.
* New problem level: Learning launches with a question such as, What is the life cycle of an animal? or How does a caterpillar become a butterfly?
* Frustration: The answers to those questions are full of sophisticated concepts and domain-specific vocabulary such as chrysalis, metamorphosis, and pupa. To push through this, a teacher might engage several modalities of instruction, including oral explanation, text-based information, and symbolic representation.
* Skill development and solidification: The teacher continues working with multiple modalities, layering in observations, experiments, and real-world experience (hatching caterpillars in the classroom) that students observe. All the while, students are practicing—through oral explanations and written descriptions—all the scientific concepts and domain-specific words.
* Positive feeling of mastery: Through formative assessment and continued work, students move from receptive to expressive, from receiving and experiencing the information to owning and sharing it.
* New problem level: Armed with their new knowledge, students are ready for new learning.
The process is similar in middle or high school, except that students bring their background knowledge.
* New problem level: Learning launches with a question such as, How is a butterfly’s life cycle similar to a frog’s life cycle? What is happening inside the chrysalis at a cellular level? or How does their habitat affect the life cycle of different butterfly species?
* Frustration: Conceptual understanding from previous learning is essential knowledge here. Students now figure out how to find the answers to the questions, pushing beyond what is easy to acquire in an effort to discover the most meaningful, relevant information.
* Skill development and solidification: Again, teachers continue the work through multiple modalities, layering in observations, experiments, and opportunities for students to demonstrate what they are learning.
* Positive feeling of mastery: The process in secondary school is much like that at lower grade levels, with students not only explaining the new knowledge but masterfully weaving in all prior knowledge as an anchor for new concepts and vocabulary.
* New problem level: The cycle begins again with new problems, questions, or opportunities for investigations.
Social, Collaborative Opportunities
Through this tenet, the learner engages in social, collaborative opportunities that grow expertise on a topic. The learning is shared not only between student and teacher but among everyone in the affinity space (which can include a meeting, an online discussion forum, or a playing field, among others). Students use networks like those described in chapter 5 (page 51) to build teams and create a kind of learning cooperative. They seek out physically close or virtual interactors. In addition to seeking feedback here, others in these spaces may view the student as an expert in some instances. For example, a student who creates a project in Minecraft and uploads it to YouTube has learned both content knowledge and peripheral skills around using Minecraft and screen capture technologies. As a result, other students who seek to replicate those actions might seek out this expert as one who can contribute to their learning processes.
Learners benefit cognitively from sharing their learning (Fawcett & Garton, 2005). We find that most learners also take solace in the fact that they are not in it alone; someone else is out there who has gone through this, or a similar journey, before. Whether someone guides the student through a particular challenge or offers guidance throughout the whole quest, he or she builds trust and rapport that can lead to future collaboration and supporting others who need assistance.
This space nurtures growth because