📚 Student View — focus on activities and learning tasks

Teaching & Learning Activities

Full 150-minute session plan

Introduction — 15 min Development — 110 min Closure — 15 min AI-Integrated

Introduction 15 min

7 min

Warm-up Pair Activity

Students turn to a neighbour and discuss: "Think of a time you learned something really well. What made it stick?"

Pairs share briefly with the room. The instructor collects 4–5 key themes on the board, linking them to upcoming theory vocabulary.

7:00
5 min

AI-Generated Scenario — Spot the Error

The instructor projects the following output from ChatGPT:

"Constructivism is a theory that focuses on how learners respond to external stimuli and reinforcement. It argues that learning occurs through conditioning and does not depend on prior knowledge or experience."
— ChatGPT (simulated, contains deliberate inaccuracy)

Discussion prompt: "Does this seem right? What might be missing or wrong here?"

🤖 AI Criticality Model

The instructor models critical questioning: What claim is being made? What discipline-specific knowledge contradicts it? Where did the AI likely simplify or conflate concepts? This sets the standard for the entire session.

3 min

Real-World Connection

A short video clip shows students collaboratively building a bridge model. The instructor pauses and asks: "Which learning theory do you think is most visible here — and why?"

Students call out responses; the instructor maps them to the board as a preview of the vocabulary to come.

Development 110 min

Part A — Collaborative Theory Mapping 40 min

40:00

Group task: In groups of 5–6, complete a comparison chart for the three learning theories using the Jamboard template provided.

Step-by-step: Jamboard instructions ▶
  1. Open jamboard.google.com and sign in with your university Google account.
  2. Your group will have a dedicated board — find it in the shared folder linked on the LMS.
  3. Each group member takes one column: View of Learner, Role of Teacher, Typical Activities, or Example Research.
  4. Add sticky notes with your ideas. Use the colour coding: yellow = Behaviourism, blue = Cognitivism, green = Social Constructivism.
  5. Discuss disagreements before the gallery walk.
Comparison Chart Dimensions:
  • View of the Learner — passive recipient, active processor, or social participant?
  • Role of the Teacher — authority, facilitator, or co-constructor?
  • Typical Classroom Activities — drill, problem-solving, or collaborative projects?
  • Example Foundational Research — Pavlov/Skinner, Piaget/Anderson, Vygotsky/Wenger?
Scaffolding Note: A partially completed comparison template is available on the LMS. Groups are encouraged to start with the pre-filled cells to reduce cognitive load and focus effort on the blank comparative cells.

🤖 AI Integration (embedded within Part A — approx. 15 min)

Step 1

Prompt the AI

Each group nominates one member to query an AI chatbot using the exact prompt:

"Define behaviourism and give one classroom example."

Record the AI's response in your Jamboard or on paper.

Step 2

Critical Interrogation

As a group, interrogate the AI response:

  • Is the definition accurate according to the handout?
  • Is the example genuinely behaviourist, or does it blend theories?
  • What important aspect did the AI leave out?
Step 3

Document Your Decisions

Record which parts of the AI response you accepted, modified, or rejected — and briefly note why. This feeds into the summative assessment.

Step 4

Instructor Probing

The instructor circulates and poses questions: "Why did you reject that claim?" / "Could the AI be right in a different context?" / "What source would you need to be certain?"

🤖 AI Criticality Checkpoint

Goal: students experience the gap between AI fluency and disciplinary accuracy. An AI can produce confident, grammatically perfect prose that is factually wrong. Disciplinary knowledge is the filter — not just gut feeling.

📋 Instructor Observation Checklist (Part A)
  • Are groups comparing across theories, or describing each theory in isolation?
  • Are students referring back to the handout/reading — or only to the AI output?
  • Is the AI step generating genuine critical discussion, or acceptance without interrogation?
  • Which groups may need a prompt to push beyond surface-level comparison?

Part B — Peer-Teaching Jigsaw 40 min

40:00

Expert group assignment: Each group is assigned one learning theory to become experts on.

Groups 1–5

Behaviourism

Pavlov, Skinner, Watson — conditioning, reinforcement, observable behaviour

Groups 6–10

Cognitivism

Piaget, Anderson — schema, information processing, mental models

Groups 11–15

Social Constructivism

Vygotsky, Wenger — ZPD, scaffolding, communities of practice

Your task: Design a 2-minute peer-teaching segment for your assigned theory. You must use an analogy, role-play, or mini-demo — not a lecture. Be creative and concrete.

🤖 Optional AI Support

Groups may ask an AI chatbot to suggest an analogy for their theory, then evaluate whether it is pedagogically accurate.

"Give me an everyday analogy that explains social constructivism to a first-year university student."
🤖 Evaluation Criteria for AI Analogies

A good analogy should: (1) accurately reflect the theory's core claim, (2) be relatable to the target audience, (3) not inadvertently suggest something from a different theory. Groups should be able to state why they accepted, modified, or rejected the AI's suggestion.

Jigsaw rotation instructions ▶
  1. Expert groups have 20 minutes to prepare their 2-minute segment using Jamboard or Miro.
  2. After preparation, regroup into jigsaw groups — each new group contains one representative from each theory group.
  3. Each representative delivers their 2-minute segment in turn.
  4. After all three segments, the jigsaw group briefly discusses: "Which theory seems most relevant to our own learning experiences — and why?"

Part C — Whole-Class Debrief & AI Criticality 30 min

Gallery Walk 10 min

10:00

Groups rotate through each other's Jamboard charts. Leave a sticky-note comment on one thing that is insightful and one thing that is unclear or contestable.

AI Reflection Discussion 20 min

The instructor facilitates a whole-class discussion using the following prompts:

Prompt 1

Where did the AI get the theory right? What did it capture accurately?

Prompt 2

Where did the AI simplify, confuse, or misrepresent? What evidence supports your view?

Prompt 3

Why might an AI produce confident-sounding but inaccurate academic content?

Prompt 4

In what circumstances is using AI for academic reading helpful — and when is it risky?

Prompt 5

How does your disciplinary knowledge change the way you read AI output compared to someone without it?

Key instructor highlights:
  • Hallucination risk: AI models generate plausible-sounding text even when incorrect — called "hallucination." Academic content requires source verification.
  • Overconfidence: AI rarely signals uncertainty. Students should not mistake confident prose for authoritative fact.
  • Disciplinary knowledge matters: The ability to spot an error in the AI's behaviourism definition came from knowing the theory — not from any AI tool.
📋 Facilitation Tips (Part C)
  • If discussion stalls on Prompt 1, redirect: "Let's look at the exact sentence — word by word. What's accurate? What's not?"
  • Avoid framing AI as purely bad — the goal is nuanced criticality, not AI phobia.
  • Acknowledge good AI use cases (scaffolding, brainstorming, drafting) while reinforcing disciplinary verification.
  • Link back to ILO 3 explicitly: "This is exactly the skill ILO 3 asks you to demonstrate in the assignment."

Synthesis & Closure 15 min

5 min

Mentimeter Post-Activity Check

How to join the Mentimeter poll ▶
  1. Go to mentimeter.com/app on your device.
  2. Enter the 6-digit code displayed on the projector screen.
  3. Answer each question using the on-screen buttons — responses are anonymous.
  4. Results appear live — the class will discuss any disagreements together.

Example questions:

  1. "Which theory best explains learning from trial and error?" (Behaviourism / Cognitivism / Social Constructivism)
  2. "Who introduced the concept of the Zone of Proximal Development?" (Vygotsky / Piaget / Skinner)
  3. "Which statement best describes a Cognitivist classroom?" (Multiple choice — 3 options)
  4. "AI output should be trusted if it sounds confident." (Agree / Disagree / It depends)
  5. "Name one thing you will verify the next time you use AI for academic research." (Word cloud)
5 min

Jigsaw Group Insights

Each jigsaw group nominates one spokesperson to share the group's single most surprising or challenging insight from the peer-teaching rotation.

Instructor charts these on the board, making connections visible across groups.

5 min

AI Closure & Individual Reflection

Students answer individually — responses saved locally:

"Think of one thing you will do differently when using AI in your future studies, based on today's session."

🤖 ILO 5 — Metacognitive AI Reflection

This response forms the seed of the summative assignment's reflective component. Students may copy it into their submission document.

Preview

Next Session

Next week: Cognitive Load Theory and Instructional Design. Think about how today's activity felt — did the comparison chart help manage the complexity? That experience connects directly to CLT.

See you next week