What's Old is New! (Official Week 4 Posting)

It should come as no surprise that our recent Bruffee assignment on collaborative learning would be of interest to me. Although, not a seminal work in the field of collaborative learning, also commonly termed problem-based learning (PBL), Bruffee's 1984 article analysed the cultural peer acceptance that is instrumental in cementing the knowledge products acquired within a PBL environment. Such conclusions are essential to some of my current work in post-graduate, medically-based, problem-based learning. In short, the seemingly 'unofficial' discourse of like-mind peers, or friends, facilitates an acceptance of new facts within a knowledge community that later solidifies the 'official' acquisition of that knowledge.

I will not recount the details of his work given that we completed the assignment recently, but I will, instead, review the implications his work has on mine. As you will recall, he uses the typical medical student as an example, since the same constructivist-based, PBL theory has been utilized in medical training since the 1950's. I believe newer works (e.g. Norton), place the inception much earlier in time. In such collaborative learning environments, a problem, or patient case, is worked up, discussed, analyzed, and solved in small groups. If Bruffee's assertion that many students and faculty place a paramount importance on "class discussion" and regard it as one of the most effective teaching tools, then the value of concentrated collaboration via small groups is easily accepted. This somewhat abnormal discourse can take place at lunch, in elevators, in hallways, and at medical dorm rooms, owing to the fact that rules, as Bruffee says, are set aside. Abnormal discourse can not be taught, but it is this same abnormal discourse that is "necessary to [normal] learning."

My work is an extension of such a premise, the value of collaborative group exchange can be more focused with fewer people. Hence, small rotational medical student groups are easier to work in that a class numbering ninety. After formal, and "normal", learning formats cease to exist in the post-graduate era of one's professional career, even smaller and more informal knowledge communities are utilized. The ubiquitous acceptance of mobile technology, coupled with the simple establishment of peer-to-peer social networks, which is to say one-on-one conversations, easily facilitates quick, self-directed, and multi-directional knowledge transfer. Whether by design, necessity, or 'just because we can' motivation, medicine has developed, and will continue to design, new pedagogical teaching and learning platforms. Bruffee's article was written 26 years before the iPad's release, yet his work is still important to our understanding of collaborative learning and technology's facilitation of those evolutionary tendencies. With professor approval, and a formal proposal, I will expand on this brief introduction for my course project!

RB