Options for Building Knowledge

Transforming accessible information into usable knowledge and new understandings is an active process. Building knowledge that is accessible for future decision-making depends not upon merely perceiving information, but upon active skills like making connections, strategic categorization, asking questions, integrating new information with prior knowledge, and active memorization.

By chunking content and creating opportunities for learners to self-assess and reflect on their learning we can help students learn how to identify, revise, and review any gaps in their learning. Establishing clear expectations supports learners to create their own goals.

Constructing usable knowledge involves collaborative knowledge building where learners co-create understanding, refine ideas, and deepen learning through lived experience and diverse perspectives. Inclusive environments with intentional design and multiple representations of information ensure access and support for all.

Consider Curation

Curation is the organization of content that is editorialized before sharing. Curation is a great way to learn to gather, categorize, and manage resources from the extensive (internet) sources available. Curation can be themed as it relates to elements of a topic being explored. Curation as a basic skill need not be relegated to grad-student-level literature reviews, annotated bibliographies, or, for example, the library we curated for this course. This article, “Using Curation Tools as a Connected Educator” (Word count: 813), explains why it’s important for students to learn the basic “art of curation.”