Mastery Learning, an instructional learning strategy

Mastery learning, or learning domain, was developed by the uk essay. Essentially, implementing content mastery in a course implies that after teaching the information that students are intended to learn, the teacher tests whether students have learned the concepts.

The goal of mastery learning is to use different teaching strategies to help the student achieve the same level of learning as those students who have already achieved mastery.

Mastery of learning, then, is about providing a range of differentiated instructional supports to students to help each student achieve mastery.

Alternative learning tools can be to work in small groups, provide audiovisual materials, use alternative textbooks or implement a practical approach; each of these activities focused on the needs of the mastery results of each student and thus motivate them to work in what they have not yet learned.

Why develop a course applying Mastery Learning?

Many myths around mastery learning are not true. What must be considered is the time that the teacher must invest in teaching methods to acquire the same level of learning.

These are some main characteristics of mastery learning that stand out in this process:

1. The design of the curriculum or content depends on the assessments.
2. Assessments are developed in any way as long as they determine competence or knowledge.
3. Promotion to the next course or level is dependent on successful completion of the prerequisites through assessment.
4. There is a curriculum committee to the success of students who are “not allowed” to give up.
5. Before moving on to the next unit, Bloom's theory suggests that students be given feedback from the assessment results to indicate:

• what concepts or knowledge they master,
• what do they need to work on

In this process, it should also be considered that the evaluated content is presented in another way, considering the possibility that the student failed due to the evaluation approach.

How to apply mastery learning in virtual education?

With the new technological tools, we can visualize the learning domain more flexibly. Organizing content into learning objective units allows teachers to develop courses at a pace that fits even the most rigid schedules.

This allows courses to be easier to implement and more effective for students; concepts and assessments are laid out in smaller and smaller components.

To develop mastery learning in a virtual course, I share some recommendations that allow this process to be carried out:

1. Let the students decide:

Build “parallel units” of content, which participants can explore in any order and at any time, letting their needs and interests guide their choices. Each unit can be explored at any depth.

It is possible to analyze the course that allows you to review the interests of the participants by clicking and participating in it. This provides an important idea of ​​who the students are and what they are interested in.

2. Encourage questions, not answers:

At the beginning of the course, you can ask students to identify a challenging question that they consider important. These "driving" questions help guide the learning experience.

In this way, meaning and purpose are built around the student's questions and objectives, an important component of mastery learning. Sharing these questions openly creates a course community.

3. Encourage network learning:

Students are willing to participate in internships during the course or change management strategies. They are excited to connect with people and ideas beyond their immediate contexts.

4. Direct the action of learning:

Students construct their own meaning by seeking new experiences and ideas in the world, not just online. They explore their communities or environments to find and document examples of the topic in question that are then reviewed and provided feedback to the student's selection process.

Consider that implementing mastery learning is not easy since a high level of success is required before students move on to new content. Nonetheless, mastery of learning is effective as a teaching strategy.