Dervin's Sense-Making is not for the faint of heart. It is a concept that requires careful reading, rereading, and thought. I found that the best way to understand what I was reading was to create pictures and diagrams. This helped me understand what was being communicated to me. I also read the article in small chunks and then reread it another time using my own drawings as references. Interestingly, the drawings that I created nearly matched some of the diagrams that were included in the reading. This gave me a sense that I was understanding what I was reading. This confidence led me to continue forward, and make more notes and drawings. It was the encouragement that I needed to reassure me that my understanding was on the right path.
Dervin was trying to communicate the important idea that it is essential to understand HOW individuals make sense of the world around them. Specifically for my classroom experience, it would be helpful for my to understand how students make sense of HTML or CSS. If I have a clear understanding of THEIR understanding, I can connect to them in ways that help THEM make sense. Relying on MY understanding doesn't necessarily assist my students. I need to consider things from their perspective and must understand how THEY make sense of computer programming so that I can better help them bridge the gap of their understanding. Sharing the material that Dervin has written with others would be no small task. Understanding my "students" for this task would be essential. I would of course break into chunks as that is the way that I and my colleagues approached it. But it would be important to understand how my students best learn new and complex material. Do they learn best through video examples? Role play? Reading? If I were to truly explain and assist them across the gap I would need to understand how they make sense of complicated information. What would be the most effective way for them to bridge that gap of understanding. Sense-Making
Perhaps the reason that sense making is such a complex and dense topic is simply because it is taking a close look at human behavior and humans themselves are complex. Sense making is a beautiful portrait of the complexities involved in education. Students are infinitely unique, and thus the way the understand and interpret the world around them is infinitely unique. Sense making is an approach to understanding these complexi
4 Comments
6/11/2017 03:28:35 pm
I agree that Dervin's Sense-Making has in depth information about why humans measure individuals making sense of the world and their actions within it. I have been breaking it down to smaller blocks of informations relating to how I see the world today using this type of research. What I find interesting is the way this book was written that it can be applied to our modern world. Now with more computerized software and search banks of data then the 1992 could dream of having this writer created a way to understand why we gather data.
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Nai Saelee
6/12/2017 12:16:02 pm
Hi Jen,
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Jen,
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Dan
6/15/2017 10:55:10 am
I like the idea of making diagrams yourself. There were some in the article and the video I watched but just having to write it down helps make meaning and to create diagrams I think would even make more meaning. Thanks for sharing.
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AuthorJen has been teaching school for awhile now. She's learned some stuff, but she's got tons more to learn. Archives
October 2017
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