Connecting Research and Practice

My time as a classroom teacher led me to consider the "why" behind teaching practices. As an undergrad, I learned about best practices but I never truly understood why those best practices were indeed, best practices. My pursuit of a degree in learning engineering fed that desire to understand more. While I'll leave this program with insights into the learning sciences, I've also developed strategies and had experiences applying those learning theories from the start of the design process.

Learning theories are lenses that we can use to look at a design. While they provide suggestions, they don't dictate what must be included in order for learning to happen. For example, in the development of my Digital Museum Tour Guides project, I consulted multiple theories about how to build upon what a specific location has to offer and used the pieces of each that were relevant to my goals. I don't have to design something that adheres to all of the suggestions of a particular learning theory in order for it to be effective and impactful.