Unintentional Learning

1. Michelle Durange Unintentional Learning

2. What is unintentional learning? • Incidental learning is also referred to as random learning, the latter term is used by UNESCO: Random learning refers to unintentional learning occurring at any time and in any place, in everyday life. Incidental (random) learning is characterized as unorganized, unstructured and unintentional. This sets it apart from informal learning , which is intentional. (edutechwiki)

3. Unintentional Learning While we learn 'formally' only in some very specific situations and periods of our life (school, training), incidental and informal learning are much more important for most of the skills and knowledge we learn during the vast majority of life. (edutechwiki) http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/Incidental_learning

4. Why is it important? • The important premise behind the incidental learning is that when a student is doing something that is fun, he can be learning a great deal without having to notice it. Learning does not necessarily have to be jammed down a student's throat. Rather, students should be allowed to adopt goals and be given materials that will cause them to pick up the desired information "in passing." It is up to course designers to construct situations in which factual knowledge can be naturally acquired. This is the basis of the Incidental Learning Architecture.

5. The first trick in employing the Incidental Learning Architecture is to find things that are inherently fun to do on a computer. This could be any good video game for example. The second trick is harder. What the student naturally wants to learn in the video game ought to be worth learning. The problem is to change the skills to be learned from hand-eye coordination tasks to content-based tasks, where one needs to know real information in order to accomplish one's goal on the computer. This will work well if there is a natural correlation between the content-based tasks and what is inherently fun.

6. Games to play • http://www.funbrain.com/ • Math ArcadeReadingArcadePlayground • Diary of a Wimpy KidAmelia Writes AgainBrewster RockitSilent KimblyOn the Rocks • Math BaseballPlural GirlsProton DonGrammar GorillasMath Car RacingAll games • Entertainment Center

7. Math Games • http://www.primarygames.com/math.htm • JumpStartMath Lines

8. Since it emphasizes the importance of getting students engaged in interesting tasks, the Incidental Learning Architecture can be seen as a version of the Simulation-Based Learning-By-Doing Architecture. The emphasis of the task in the Incidental Learning architecture is different, however. Typically, in learning-by-doing exercises, we want the student to learn the skills involved in the task. But, in the Incidental Learning Architecture, the emphasis is on the facts involved. The student's task is constructed so as to bring him into contact with the facts in a natural way. (engines4ed) • http://www.engines4ed.org/hyperbook/nodes/NODE-151-pg.html

9. Effects on students • Contemporary tertiary students require a different set of skills from the population of students who attended university campuses even just a decade ago. The modern student is expected to be comfortable and often proficient with both printed and digital resources. Such a level of expertise is necessary not only so students can access study materials, but to also enable them to efficiently filter information, communicate using diverse methods and store relevant resources within practical and logical systems. Many university courses now include components which provide opportunities for students to develop digital information competencies and such skills are almost essential to succeed within current academic and employment contexts.

10. Research M. Cseh, K. E. Watkins and V. J. Marsick, “Informal and Incidental Learning in the Workplace, Proceedings of the Annual Conference of the Academy of Human Resource Development, 1998. What the future holds for our students in the workforce: Marsick and Watkins (1998) are less concerned with who organizes a specific activity or teaching process, and thus controls inputs, than with understanding how people learn using informal approaches. In practice, workers may not set out intentionally and explicitly to accomplish particular ends through preplanned means. Often, their choices evolve their interaction with others in the midst of work activities. Sometimes they become conscious of these choices; at other times, they remain partially or completely unaware.

11. The Research http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql Context Context

12. Video • http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=47e908b2390337f65375&page=&viewtype=&category=&action=addfavour • Using a video for students to watch helps students learn that are visual learners. • Games help students learn that are kinetics and visual.

13. Conclusions • speculate that there may be a progression, or • possibly a refining, of learning processes moving from incidental learning through informal learning to self-directed • learning as intention, reflection, awareness, and accessibility increase.

14. Controversy about the nature -- and even the existence -- of implicit learning is not likely to be resolved soon. • But theory and research in this area continues to sharpen distinctions between informal and incidental learning, and • adds to understanding about how to enhance the latter. • http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/1b/df/bf.pdf

15. As a teacher we often think that we are the queen of the castle and that all learning comes from the mouth of the teacher. The truth is that students learn more than we ever teach them. When they are on the playground they learn how to play with others and gain social acceptance. Students learn different things everyday many things that we have never formally taught them./

16. References • http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=47e908b2390337f65375&page=&viewtype=&category=&action=addfavour • http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql • http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/Incidental_learning • http://www.engines4ed.org/hyperbook/nodes/NODE-151-pg.html • M. Cseh, K. E. Watkins and V. J. Marsick, “Informal and Incidental Learning in the Workplace,Proceedings of the Annual Conference of the Academy of Human Resource Development, 1998. • www.funbrain.com