Dimensions of Learning
In 2003, The Rockhampton Grammar School began a staff development program to enhance the quality of teaching and learning throughout the school. The framework called Dimensions of Learning will be implemented in 2005 from years one to twelve.
Dimensions of Learning, or DOL, is a comprehensive model of five thinking attributes that are essential for successful learning. Based on recent research into the brain and cognition, the framework was developed by Dr Robert Marzano at the Mid-continent Regional Educational Laboratory in Denver, Colorado. Its premise is that these five types of thinking enable teachers and a school to plan for and achieve learning gains for all students.
Dimensions of Learning emphasises the explicit teaching and development of complex reasoning processes, the significance of the classroom climate in which they are developed and the habits of mind required for students to actively engage in the process of learning.
The Five Dimensions
- Dimension 1: Attitudes and Perceptions. Dimension 1 helps students to develop positive attitudes and perceptions about the classroom and learning.
- Dimension 2: Acquire and Integrate Knowledge. Dimension 2 helps students to relate, organise and store new knowledge and to master new skills and processes.
- Dimension 3: Extend and Refine Knowledge. Dimension 3 helps students to rigorously analyse what they have learned by applying reasoning processes that extend and refine the information. Comparing, Classifying and Analysing Perspectives are some examples of these reasoning processes.
- Dimension 4: Use Knowledge Meaningfully. Dimension 4 helps students to learn effectively by using their knowledge to perform meaningful tasks. Decision Making, Problem Solving and Invention are some of the six complex reasoning processes used to construct tasks for the meaningful use of knowledge.
- Dimension 5: Productive Habits of Mind. Dimension 5 helps students to develop powerful habits of mind that enable them to think critically, think creatively and regulate their behaviour.
Dimensions of Learning shifts the focus in schools to the learner from teacher centred models of the past. It achieves this through the development of higher-order thinking skills and the meaningful use of knowledge rather than a focus on subject content alone. In addition, the framework uses a straightforward, common language that will aid its implementation throughout the school and its community.
