Sense-Making and Meaning Making--What is the connection?
In doing some research around Sense-Making I came across the above graphic, which I believe helps me make sense of link between Sense-Making and Meaning Making. I feel like I have a good understanding of what Meaning Making looks like, as I have spent a lot of time with the new ELA/ELD Framework and the Circles of Implementation. One of the five circles focuses on Meaning Making. But as I "closely read" Dervin's Sense-Making Methodology, I feel l have a better understanding of what Sense-Making means. Now, I am trying to understand how one feeds the other. Dervin states "Sense-Making has come to be used to refer to a theoretic net, a set of assumptions and propositions, and a set of methods which have been developed to study the making of sense that people do in their everyday experiences." So it is theory, and the meaning making is how one might apply it their personal experience? Diving into Dervin: My meta-cognitive process and what exactly she is trying to say. I spent several days combing through this article. I use my AVID marking up the text strategies, marking in both the left and right hand margin the "gist", underlining important information and circling things I wasn't sure about. A few pages at a time was key for me to be able to digest it. Now, onto what she is trying to teach, the facts, processes, concepts and principles! Dervin discusses discontinuity "as a fundamental aspect of reality", and a constant of nature and the human condition. Moments are seen as vehicles for examining gap-defining and gap-bridging, not necessarily reality. Information use can be captured by looking more specifically at gap defining and gap-bridging. By focusing on the gap we can gain more relevant and pertinent information. As we or our student's construct knowledge they come across gaps, and what they do to bridge that gap provides information to use as teachers as to how they are sense making, and eventually making meaning or personalizing for them. She states that sense-making research is usually a systematic qualitative research, which is similar to the power of systematic quantitative research. "The act of constructing and the act of using that which is constructed is a qualitative act." She states "the use of a standard is itself a constructing". Some may chose to judge that standard by accuracy, expediency, familiarity and/or comfort. To me this is how many of us digest information, we construct our knowledge using the terms and facts we need to support that. If I had to teach this to a high-school student, I would begin with some images that get at what Dervin is saying. The images that Ms. Curtis used during our first session allowed many of us to see some of the connections. I have used Visual Thinking Strategies in my classroom, and using those same 4 questions with images that relate to Sense-Making would be a place I would start. Then chunking the article to do a close read. A close reading of a short, worthy passage from her Mind's Eye of the User, along with specific questions that get the reader to think a bit more about specific aspects. Lastly, an after-reading task, a way for the students to take what they have learned and process it. This blog has allowed me to process, and even begin to apply it as I think about the connection back to meaning-making, the more personalized process. I look forward to reading other student's blogs in my cohort, as the will only enhance my sense-making of this sense-making ;)
4 Comments
Becky
2/4/2017 12:49:43 pm
Karly- I really enjoyed your blog post. You looked at it from another angle. After reading your blog, I re-read the section about gap-defining and gap-bridging. It reminded me of the youtube video I saw with Dervin speaking, she noted that many institutions group people based on demographics and assume all people of that demographic have the same wants and needs. Dervin focuses on the information gap, and how the individual defines solutions to bridge the gap.
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Joseph Hall
2/4/2017 01:35:52 pm
It's interesting to read how each one us takes notes and processes the information. I used a computer and word document to take down notes, whereas you used two column notes, underlining and circling words. Both techniques worked, however they were achieved in different ways.
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Kelley S. Miller
2/4/2017 02:21:27 pm
I also had to tap into my AVID strategies for digesting this text, writing notes in the margins and highlighting/underlining what stood out. It was a good practicum in seeing that those strategies really are useful.
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I enjoyed reading your blog post Karly. It gave me a sense of understanding of this sense making. We had some similar things that were focused on such as the gap approach and how individuals make sense of their situation. I have to admit it wasn't that easy for me to understand and diagrams that were provided helped me make some sense of things. I think I am more of a visual learner especially when learning becomes challenging and difficult to make sense of. I think it's great how you have used circles of implementation and how it has helped you in sense making.
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