Note: this post was created as an assignment for the course LDT100x Instructional Design and Technology: Learning Theories You can learn more about this course (and the Micro-Master's program it is a part of) here.
Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash
How I Learned to Create
For my MicroLearning Activity, I want to discuss my learning to use Canva for the MicroMaster's program and LDT 100x Instructional Design and Technology: Learning Theories.
Canva is a free design tool that allows users to create charts, presentations, infographics, promotional materials, and social media-related content. Since starting with the platform, I have used Canva for a variety of elements, including:
Infographics
Logos
Charts
Presentations
Flyers
YouTube Thumbnails
The process of using Canva, for me, related closely to insights from constructivism, cognitivism, and connectivism. To begin, I identified Canva as an appropriate platform via information from another course in the MicroMaster's sequence, LDT200x Instructional Design Models. After seeing this platform proposed as a suggestion for course use, I clicked on the link and perused the platform. In this case, the instructor of the course acted as a facilitator in access to technology and the learning was mediated through technology (Siemens, 2005).
Constructivist theorists argue that learners incorporate new knowledge into their existing knowledge schema through an active process (Tchoshanov, 2013). By relying on the provided templates to start and working my way up to editing the templates and creating new templates my learning was active (as opposed to passive). I learned through doing, which according to constructivists and cognitivists are ways to ensure genuine learning and the committal of new information to long-term memory (Guyan, 2013; McLeod, 2020).
My "a-ha" Moment: Andragogy and Constructivism in Action
At the beginning of the MicroMaster's program, I had never used Canva. As I progressed through the course sequence, I used it not only for specific needs related to the courses, but also to create infographics and presentations that I used in my current work role.
The major obstacle that I had in using Canva was, quite honestly, my own perfectionism and desire to do too much too quickly when working with the platform. I attempted to create an infographic from scratch (i.e., without a template) early on in the process and found myself quickly frustrated with my lack of graphic design skills.
I was able to recognize that I had not yet built the skills in the platform to create an infographic from scratch. So, I went back to the templates and found one that I wanted to work with. I would then play around with the templates and additional features (such as changing colors, graphics, adding sections, etc...) to see what would happen and what types of edits I could make within the existing templates. I relied on my own intrinsic motivation (a core element of Knowles' principles of adult learning) and the knowledge and experience that I was building through using the platform (Kurt, 2020). Much like constructivists and adult learning theorists suggested, I experienced a jump in my learning abilities through active, problem-based, "real world" scenarios, as opposed to multiple choice questions or other traditional forms of learning assessments.
The real "a-ha" for me was realizing what I did not know and figuring out how to best gain the knowledge and skills that I would need to successfully utilize the platform to complete my assignments. I am now able to complete projects in Canva much quicker and with less stress than when I started learning the platform.
Sources:
Guyan, M. (2013). 5 ways to reduce cognitive load in learning. eLearning Industry. https://elearningindustry.com/5-ways-to-reduce-cognitive-load-in-elearning
Kurt, S. (2020). Andragogy theory- Malcolm Knowles. Educational Technology. https://educationaltechnology.net/andragogy-theory-malcolm-knowles/.
McLeod, S. (2020). Lev Vygotsky's sociocultural theory. SimplyPsychology https://www.simplypsychology.org/vygotsky.html.
Siemens, G. (2005). Connectivism: A learning theory for the digital age. https://jotamac.typepad.com/jotamacs_weblog/files/Connectivism.pdf
Tchoshanov, M. (2013). Engineering of learning: Conceptualizing e-didactics. UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education.
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