Teaching, Teacher Knowledge and Constructivism

Educational Research for Policy and Practice 2: 195–204, 2003.© 2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

Teaching, Teacher Knowledge and Constructivism

Kok-Aun Toh, Boon-Tiong Ho, Charles M.K. Chew and Joseph P. Riley IINational Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University

Singapore

Abstract

An effective education program delivers a satisfactory level of achievement for every student.For this to happen, we must examine carefully the implications of educational theories andresearch for teaching and learning. The way a teacher conducts his or her lessons mustalso be examined critically. This paper will deal with teaching, teacher knowledge andconstructivism. For teaching, some reasons were suggested for the observation why it hadnot changed significantly since the last 40 years in Asian classrooms. In the area of teacherknowledge, the authors report a recent research finding on pedagogical content knowledge(PCK) development. The paper concludes with a discussion on whether constructivism isindeed a better way to teach.

Key Words: constructivism, pupil-centred instruction, teacher knowledge, teaching styles,teaching

Introduction

Various research studies (Anderson & Helms, 2001; Mendro, 1998; Powell &Anderson, 2002; Strong & Tucker, 2000) have emphasized the important role ofteachers in the successful implementation of any educational program. If studentsare going to obtain a satisfactory level of achievement, teachers must examineseriously how they teach. Countries can build new schools, equip them with thelatest computers and information technology, and revise the curriculum to suitchanging global needs but it is the teacher who has to provide strong linkagesbetween the structures, processes and resources and the learners. After all, thereis a limit to the upgrading of the hardware and the software. And when all is saidand done, it is still the teachers who lie at the heart of the educational process. Thebest laid plans and programs can go awry if we do not have competent teachers(Brophy, 1997; Rust, 1999) who understand and are committed to the educationalgoals of the nation. They are the interface between the curriculum and the learner.The best curriculum will be delivered in a disintegrated manner if the teachers arenot adequately equipped and prepared.

196 KOK-AUN TOH ET AL.

Teaching Methods in Classrooms Today

Take a close look at most Asian classrooms 40 years ago and compare them withthose you see today. The one thing that will strike most observers is the familiarpattern with which teaching is carried out in many different schools both then andtoday. What happens today is almost exactly what one would see in the 1960s –one that would have been categorized as wholly teacher-centered. The studentssat in rows then, discussions were teacher-led with the teacher spending 90% ofinstructional time teaching the entire class. This uniformity in instructional style,irrespective of time and school, appears to be linked to the apparent invulnerabilityof teachers to change (Cuban, 1979). This is not to say that there were no changesbeing instituted over this period. What an ardent observer would notice is that theinstructional style remains unchanged, impervious to any proposed changes, muchlike the stormy weather when typhoon winds sweep across the ocean waters whileunderneath, near the ocean floor, relative calm prevails.

There seems to be some form of seemingly stubborn promulgation of the teacher-centered approach in classroom instruction. One would not find much evidence ofsignificant change in instructional style despite the inputs of pre-service trainingand the many findings from research in educational journals arguing for reforma-tion towards instruction that is more student-centered. The evidence suggests thatteaching practices seem remarkably stable at all levels of schooling through themany decades, despite improvements in teacher education and inputs of scholarlyknowledge. Many teachers have switched over from the traditional overhead trans-parencies to PowerPoint and other web-based links as their medium of delivery. Ithas, however, not altered the fact that teaching is still very much teacher-centered.

Operationalizing Teacher-Centered and Student-Centered Instruction

For clarity of discussion, it is useful to operationalize what is meant by teacher-centered and student-centered instruction. Teacher-centered instruction means thatthe teacher controls what is taught. Someone who enters a classroom with teacher-centered instruction would be able to identify the following elements:• teacher talk exceeds student talk during instruction;• instruction is mostly to the entire class;• textbooks guide what is being taught in class;• each episode within the lesson is determined by the teacher;• desks and chairs are usually arranged into neat rows facing the chalkboard/white-

board and the teacher;• students are not free to roam from their seats.Student-centered instruction means that students assume a certain degree of re-sponsibility for what is taught and how it is learned. There is a slant towardsexperiential learning and making discoveries for themselves (Martin, Sexton, Wag-

TEACHING, TEACHER KNOWLEDGE AND CONSTRUCTIVISM 197

ner & Gerlovich, 1994). The following elements are what one would observe in aclass with student-centered instruction:• students’ on-task conversation or discussion is at least equal to, if not greater

than, teacher talk;• instruction occurs individually or in small groups, rather than being directed as

an entire class by the teacher;• a variety of instructional materials are on hand to enable students to use them

independently or in small groups;• students, through their interactions with the teacher, determine the direction of

the lesson;• furniture in the classroom is arranged in a manner which facilitates students to

work independently or together in groups;• students roam about freely, if need be, while remaining on-task.

Why is one particular tradition flourishing so well, while the other has not takenoff in Asian societies? To begin with, it is useful to examine the interaction, ineach case, of both the teacher and the learner to the knowledge to be acquired. Inteacher-centered instruction, knowledge is often (though not always) presented tothe learner assuming the latter as a tabula rasa or blank slate. In student-centeredinstruction, knowledge is often constructed by the learner, capitalising on the innateinquisitiveness of the learner. Which of the two constitutes good teaching? If thecriterion for judging good teaching is measured by the teacher’s success in creatingan atmosphere where students want to learn, then the latter would score highlyas the preferred method. On the surface, it would therefore appear strange thatteachers should continue to cling to the teacher-centered approach. A number ofreasons can be advanced for Asian teachers’ hesitation to make such a headlongchange.

Five Reasons for Inertia to Change in Teaching Styles

The first reason has to do with tradition and cultural beliefs. The Asian way ofupbringing is guided by a deep reverence for the accumulated wisdom of their eld-ers. The ’teacher knows best’ recognition given to teachers provides the teacher thepassport to practice the teacher-centered approach. Additionally, the upholding ofsuch recognition by the students virtually cements the validity of such an approach.Parents are also more comfortable with teacher-centered teaching. Teachers aredeemed to be doing their work with teacher-centered teaching. A teacher whopasses on the responsibility of learning to the learner is viewed in some wayswith suspicion, and would seem to be passing on his work to his students. Thepersistence of the teacher-centered approach by virtue of such traditions may notbe true for the Western culture, but it is something which may well be empoweringin the Eastern tradition.


The second reason is one which may be attributed to performance orientation ofsociety at large. Classrooms are dominated by teaching practices that concentrateon definite content and skills that have to be learnt in order to pass examinations.With such an orientation there is the tendency of students to prefer their teachersgiving them the relevant information in an authoritative way through a teacher-centered approach rather than allowing them to discover on their own. To them, it isa practicality issue, and discovery approaches tantamount to a “waste” of valuabletime; time which can be used to complete the syllabus. A fundamental shift froma teacher-centred approach to a student-centred one therefore does not go downwell with students. Hence the prevailing teacher-centred practices continue to reignsupreme because of this student-driven behaviour.

Thirdly, the question of inertia is important. Why do something else when allthe while you are doing alright with the teacher-centered approach? This inertiastems from the freedom of choice given to classroom teachers. Policy makers andcurriculum developers do not insist but encourage the use of student-centered ap-proaches, and allow teachers to actually weigh the pros and cons of the approachfor themselves in the actual implementation of a curriculum, with the hope thatthey will change in the light of research evidence. The hoped-for change has notcome about. Instead, what has resulted is the adoption of bits of student-centeredactivities that suit the teachers for their particular situation, but by and large thedominant mode of instruction remains as a teacher-centered one.

The fourth reason is an organisational structure which does not facilitate aswitchover from a teacher-centered approach to one which is student-centered.Structure here refers to the physical arrangement of desks and chairs in the class-rooms, the amount of content to be covered, the time allotted to tasks, and the waythe examination questions are framed. As long as organisational structures are notaltered, what is being promoted will be lip service. Teachers have coped with mul-tiple demands of the day by adopting certain teaching practices that have emergedas resilient and time-tested strategies. Any switchover will mean convincing themfirst.

The seating arrangement in the classroom, made up of rows, permit easy sur-veillance and thus maintenance of order. Any unsolicited movement from theirseats is frowned upon. Class routines require students to raise their hands, and toanswer only when the teacher says so. Students can leave the room only whenpermission is granted by the teacher. All these are valuable controls when youhave a large class to manage and when students are less motivated to learn. Inthis context, the teacher-centered approach is seen as an efficient strategy. Student-centered approaches where students move around freely, as well as being allowedto determine for themselves what is to be done, can ruin the usual teacher routines.With the existing organizational structure, teachers are not likely to trade-off theirtime-tested teacher-centered approaches for one over which they have little control.

Lastly, one needs to recognize that all teachers entering the teaching profes-sion have unwittingly served as “apprentices” as they watch their teachers teach


when they were students in school for 13 years or so. This “apprenticeship” tendsto provide stability over time. The methods promulgated by teachers, learned intheir own school days, seem to enable the class to plod along satisfactorily. AsDearden (1967) has put it, “A teaching method which genuinely leaves thingsopen for discovery also necessarily leaves open the opportunity for not discoveringthem.” Instead of making fundamental shifts, the survival instinct would favour thestatus quo, with some fine tuning of the already familiar techniques, and adding avariation or two to existing ones.

These reasons, collectively and individually, serve to explain how well teacher-centered teaching has survived the test of time. It might not be fashionable to sayso, but the teacher-centered teaching (with the teacher presenting materials in asystematic way) can be enormously effective, while the student-centered alternat-ive can be hopelessly ineffective. Leaving students to discover for themselves canbe counterproductive at times. The particular preference of teachers for teacher-centered instruction must appear as a rejection of the more student-centered ap-proach to instruction. Before being taken to task for attempting to identify thesetwo instructional modes as the sole prevailing practices, it must be noted that thesetwo practices are the extremes of a continuum and that most teachers operate atsome point on the continuum.

Teachers are bound to adopt into their act particular practices they find useful.Teachers, who find the discovery-style approach overly radical and feel the lossof control on how their classes should progress, will adopt a guided-discoverystyle as a compromise. Such a teacher would be considered to have selectivelyadopted student-centered practices. The teacher would be deemed to be operatingsomewhere along the continuum. Along the continuum there would be instancesof teacher-centered instruction, as well as those of student-centered instruction.Instead of a quantum leap from one approach to another, one can view the situationas teachers taking incremental steps from one extreme to the other. As teachersbecome more competent using various approaches, they will realize that no singleapproach meets the needs of all students.

The teaching-learning process depends on many factors such as the nature ofthe topic to be taught; the personality of the teacher; the age, intelligence, interests,and prior experiences of the students, amongst others. It is a dangerous tendencyto assume there is one best way to teach. What is good for a topic with a particularteacher with a particular class in a particular school may not be so when any of thedimensions change. The important thing is for teachers to arm themselves with awide repertoire of teaching approaches and not fossilize themselves with only onesingle approach.


Teacher Knowledge

We know who the good teachers are and we can recognize good teaching when wesee it; yet, it is very difficult to describe what constitutes good teaching. This isoften because teachers have to apply knowledge from multiple domains of teacherknowledge to their classroom practices. Among these domains are knowledge ofpedagogy, knowledge of learners, subject matter knowledge, and pedagogical con-tent knowledge (Shulman, 1986).

Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) is that unique knowledge domain ofteaching that distinguishes the expert teacher in a subject area from the subjectexpert. PCK is that special professional understanding that teachers have wherebythey can integrate, transform and represent subject matter knowledge in ways thatare comprehensible to students. Research evidence tells us that both subject matterknowledge (SMK) and PCK are crucial to good teaching and student understanding(Reynolds, 1992; Lourdusamy, Toh & Wong, 2001).

Oftentimes we have teachers who are very knowledgeable about their contentarea but are somehow unable to present the content in such a way that others cancomprehend. Shulman (1987) considered this to be that very important part ofteacher knowledge where one moves “from personal comprehension to preparingfor the comprehension of others.” A teacher cannot hope to explain something ifhe does not have full comprehension of that something. As educators we know that“to teach is first to understand.” Only when the teacher understands something wellenough is he able to teach others. He needs to overcome the various barriers thatmight otherwise deny his students access to knowledge. He must possess effectiveways to help his students link their studies to real world. He must have both SMKand PCK.

Studies have indicated that novice teachers often struggle to represent conceptsin an understandable manner to their students because they have little or no PCK attheir disposal (see, for example, Kagan, 1992; Reynolds, 1992; van Driel, Verloop& de Vos, 1998). There are also teachers who have taught for many years, but havenot reflected on their practice. They can be considered as novices as well. Noviceteachers, for example, do not see much difference in telling and explaining becausethey have not developed their PCK.

Using a range of subjects from pre-service to master teachers, Ho (2003) studiedthe development of PCK through the use of reflective portfolios and concluded thatit was a gradual change process involving three phases:• Phase 1: The Mimicry Phase (Ignorance/Imitation),• Phase 2: The Motivation Phase (Interest/Information/Involvement),• Phase 3: The Mastery Phase (Internalisation/Integration).

Teachers in the Mimicry Phase tend to be concerned about the accuracy of theircontent knowledge. They focus predominantly on planning for the teaching of theSMK of the discipline. In the absence of someone who can handhold them, as in


the case of the master craftsman-apprentice relationship, the natural fallback is toimitate the teachers who taught them during their schooldays.

In contrast, teachers in the Motivation Phase are keen to explore other know-ledge domains (such as choice of teaching materials and background knowledgeof the students) besides just SMK. They tend to be more relaxed and involved inseeking out appropriate pedagogical approaches for their students. They are moreconscious of the way they are teaching.

The Mastery Phase is exhibited by master teachers who possess a wide reper-toire of strategies to get across the most difficult concepts. Teachers in this phaseare likely to be conscious whether students are internalizing a concept expounded.They are more conscious about their PCK and the need to get a concept acrosswithout resorting to the textbook or to a definition. They understand the need toadopt the constructivist pedagogy to help students make sense of the world theylive in.

Constructivism: A Better Way to Teach

It has become fashionable to talk about constructivism in relation to science teach-ing and learning, as well as for many other subject areas. It is a philosophy oflearning founded on the premise that by reflecting on our experiences, we constructour own understanding of the world we live in. The concept of constructivism hasits roots in classical antiquity, going back to Socrates’ dialog with his followers, inwhich he asked direct questions that led his followers to realise for themselves theweaknesses in their thinking. Piagetian ideas of assimilation, accommodation andcognitive equilibrium, together with Kelly’s (1955) personal construct theory andBruner’s (1960) framework for instruction, have played major roles in the devel-opment of constructivist pedagogy. In contrast with the concept of the learner as apassive receiver of knowledge, in a constructivist classroom’ students are activelyinvolved in the learning process.

Research has brought up the importance of constructivism (Cheung and Toh,1992; Yager, 1991) in science teaching. If students construct new knowledge out ofthe experiences they encounter, then it makes sense for the teacher to grasp somepart of their experience and connect it to the knowledge to be taught. To ensurestudent understanding requires active student involvement in what is to be learned,give them as many opportunities as possible to practice what has been learned.Though the emphasis is on the student, constructivism does not dismiss the activerole of the teacher or the value of expert knowledge. It should therefore not be con-fused with discovery learning. Constructivism modifies that role, so that teachershelp students to construct knowledge rather than reproduce a series of facts. Theconstructivist teacher provides tools such as problem-solving and inquiry-basedactivities with which students formulate and test their ideas, draw conclusions


and inferences, and pool and convey their knowledge in a collaborative learningenvironment.

Constructivism transforms the student from a passive recipient of information toan active participant in the learning process. Always guided by the teacher, studentsconstruct their knowledge actively rather than just mechanically ingesting know-ledge from the teacher or the textbook. When knowledge is actively constructed bythe learner, and not passively received from the environment, the student is activelyprocessing the new knowledge. The process of coming to know is the result ofinteraction of the new knowledge with the learner’s experience of the world. It isan enormously sensible and rational approach to learning. It has gained fairly wideacceptance in many parts of the world and labelled by Matthews (1993) as the neworthodoxy of science teaching.

There are however two pitfalls when embracing the constructivist pedagogy.The first pitfall has to do with radical constructivism – those who truly embraceconstructivism. In the true spirit of constructivism (von Glasersfeld, 1989), andthat means “learning science is simply a matter of students making sense of theworld”, any views which students arrive at, for reasons that satisfy them, shouldbe regarded as acceptable. Take the example of a middle school student in theU.S. who insists she can see an object in an enclosed room when the lights areswitched off (Macbeth, 2000). The teacher must recognize that the student is notwrong as far as she is concerned, because the student might not have encounteredcomplete darkness. She is making sense of the world as she knows it. This bringsconstructivism into conflict with rationality of science.

The second pitfall has to do with social constructivism. In social constructivismthe assumption is that the process of learning is an entirely rational and logicalactivity. However, learning sometimes does not occur that way. We know, fromthe work of Posner, Strike, Hewson & Gertzog (1982), that new learning can bebrought about when learners are dissatisfied with their pre-existing belief or un-derstanding (as when confronted with a discrepant event), especially when the newknowledge being presented is:• intelligible (that the learner fully comprehends what the new knowledge means);• plausible (it is something that is both believable and consistent with pre-existing

knowledge of the learner);• fruitful (it is able to provide something of value to the learner like providing a

solution to some unresolved problem).Teaching therefore involves lowering the status of students’ pre-existing views

and raising the status of the new knowledge with respect to intelligibility, plausib-ility and fruitfulness to the learner. Learning involves rejection of the pre-existingview for the new view. However, there are many occasions where the new view isbeing rejected in spite of all the above efforts being fulfilled. Using the exampleearlier, the student argues that she knows that given sufficient time for her eyesto adjust, she will be able to see the object even in complete darkness (Macbeth,2000). After a five-minute wait time in the dark for her eyes to adjust, she still


rejects all the evidence that light reflection from an object is necessary for vision.What do we do with a learner who does not wish to “jump ship” despite all theevidence? This is a case where all the rationality and logical arguments presentedare still being rejected.

Conclusion

This re-visit of teaching, teacher knowledge, and constructivism has enabled us tore-think and perhaps sharpen our thoughts of some of the time-tested ways whereeducation is taking place. The paper argues that there are valid reasons why teacher-centered teaching has survived the test of time. It may even appear strange thereforethat there are still those who advocate strenuously for student-centered discoverylearning methods with its hands-on emphasis. What chance is there for children todiscover, say, the magnetic lines of force when provided with a bar magnet and ironfilings? They cannot discover things for which they are not conceptually prepared.They would not know what to look for, or how to look for them (Hodson, 1993).

Sound knowledge of subject matter does not automatically confer the personwith skills to transfer this subject matter knowledge (SMK) to others, or to makethem understand. The special skill which makes a teacher a teacher is pedagogicalcontent knowledge (PCK). Good teaching requires both the mastery of SMK aswell as PCK. PCK is developed over time. A novice teacher is not expected tohave much PCK vis-à-vis the master teacher. Teachers go through a mimicry phaseto a motivational phase, and then a mastery phase in the build-up of their PCK. Amaster teacher attempts to provide new experiences which will link or connect thelearner’s pre-existing experiences. The learner then finds it easier to integrate thenew experiences to the existing knowledge structures.

Constructivism is the buzz word of the day. While the radical constructivistsdraw heavily from the work of Piaget, Kelly and Bruner, the social constructivistshave their roots in Vygotsky’s theory. While there are pluses in constructivism,this paper also brings to light the pitfalls associated with the stand taken by each ofthe two groups of constructivists. One needs therefore to tread with caution in thepractice of constructivism.

Currently, there are several tensions at the very heart of education reform –the tension between learner-centered and teacher-centered approaches, the ten-sion between knowing science and knowing how to teach science, and the tensionbetween fully accepting and critically questioning constructivism. There is also alarger tension of reform, the tension between hopelessness that things will neverchange, and an optimism that they will change for the better. To end with a certaindegree of optimism we are hopeful that the teaching methods supported by culturalbeliefs and inertia are something which can be reformed by “those at the heart ofthe educational process” – the teacher.


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Teaching, Teacher Knowledge and Constructivism