Vygotsky’s Social Development Theory

Summary: Social Development Theory argues that social interaction precedes development; consciousness and cognition are the end product of socialization and social behavior.Originator: Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934).Key terms: Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD), More Knowledgeable Other (MKO)

Vygotsky’s Social Development Theory is the work of Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934), who lived during Russian Revolution. Vygotsky’s work was largely unkown to the West until it was published in 1962.Vygotsky’s theory is one of the foundations of constructivism. It asserts three major themes:Major themes:

1. Social interaction plays a fundamental role in the process of cognitive development. In contrast to Jean Piaget’s understanding of child development (in which development necessarily precedes learning), Vygotsky felt social learning precedes development. He states: “Every function in the child’s cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first, between people (interpsychological) and then inside the child (intrapsychological).” (Vygotsky, 1978).

2. The More Knowledgeable Other (MKO). The MKO refers to anyone who has a better understanding or a higher ability level than the learner, with respect to a particular task, process, or concept. The MKO is normally thought of as being a teacher, coach, or older adult, but the MKO could also be peers, a younger person, or even computers.

3. The Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). The ZPD is the distance between a student’s ability to perform a task under adult guidance and/or with peer collaboration and the student’s ability solving the problem independently. According to Vygotsky, learning occurred in this zone.

Vygotsky focused on the connections between people and the sociocultural context in which they act and interact in shared experiences (Crawford, 1996). According to Vygotsky, humans use tools that develop from a culture, such as speech and writing, to mediate their social environments. Initially children develop these tools to serve solely as social functions, ways to communicate needs. Vygotsky believed that the internalization of these tools led to higher thinking skills.Applications of the Vygotsky’s Social Development TheoryMany schools have traditionally held a transmissionist or instructionist model in which a teacher or lecturer ‘transmits’ information to students. In contrast, Vygotsky’s theory promotes learning contexts in which students play an active role in learning. Roles of the teacher and student are therefore shifted, as a teacher should collaborate with his or her students in order to help facilitate meaning construction in students. Learning therefore becomes a reciprocal experience for the students and teacher.For more information, see:

Driscoll, M. P. (1994). Psychology of Learning for Instruction. Needham, MA: Allyn & Bacon. Crawford, K. (1996) Vygotskian approaches to human development in the information era. Educational Studies in

Mathematics. (31) 43-62. Vygotsky, L.S. (1978). Mind and society: The development of higher mental processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press. Wertsch, James V. Sohmer, Richard. (1995). Vygotsky on learning and development. Human Development. (38 )

332-37.

Lev Vygotsky ( 1896 - 1934) Social Constructivism

Biography

Vygotsky earned a law degree from Moscow University in 1917. His studies included philosophy, psychology and literature. In 1924 he presented a paper at the Russian Psycho–neurological Congress. This led to his joining the Psychological Institute of Moscow University. His work was banned for political reasons and was not to emerge until the 1950's. His work has formed a foundation for constructivist theories.

Theory

Vygotsky shared many of Piaget's views about child development, but he was more interested in the social aspects of learning. Vygotsky differs from discovery learning, which is also based on Piaget's ideas, in that the teacher and older children play important roles in learning. The teacher is typically active and involved. The classroom should provide variety of learning materials (including electronic) and experiences and the classroom culture provides the child with cognitive tools such as language, cultural history, and social context.

The Zone of Proximal Development is a concept for which Vygotsky is well known. It refers to the observation that children, when learning a particular task or body of information, start out by not being able to do the task. Then they can do it with the assistance of an adult or older child mentor, and finally they can do it without assistance. The ZPD is the stage where they can do it assisted, but not alone. Thus the teacher often serves to guide a child or group of children as they encounter different learning challenges.

Vygotsky's observations led him to propose a complex relationship between language and thought. He observed egocentric speech and child monologues such as Piaget wrote about, as well as internal speech. He proposed that speech (external language) and thought have different origins within the human individual. He described thought as non-verbal, and speech as having a pre-intellectual stage, in which words are not symbols for the objects they denote, but are properties of the objects. Up to about age two, they are independent. After that thought and speech become connected. At this point, speech and thought become interdependent, and thought becomes verbal. Thus, children's monologues become internalized as internal dialog.

Vygotsky differed from Piaget in that he considered development after age 2 as, at least partially determined by language. He believed that egocentric speech serves the function of self-guidance, and eventually becomes internalized. It is only spoken aloud because the child has not yet learned how to internalize it. He found that egocentric speech decreased when the child's feeling of being understood diminished, as when there was no listener or the listener was occupied with other matters. These ideas, while intriguing, have never been adequately researched, so it is difficult to evaluate their significance.

While there can be wide variation of activities and content in a Vygotskian classroom, four principles always apply: 1. Learning and development is a social, collaborative activity 2. The Zone of Proximal Development can serve as a guide for curricular and lesson planning 3. Classroom activity should be reality-based and applicable to the real world 4. Learning extends to the home and other out-of-school environments and activities and all learning situations should be related. http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/social/Vygotsky.htmlJerome Bruner (1915 - ) Constructivism & Discovery Learning

Biography

Born New York City, October 1, 1915. He received his A.B. degree from Duke University in 1937 and his Ph.D in 1947 from Harvard. He was on the faculty in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University.from 1952 - 1972.

In 1960 Bruner published The Process of Education. This was a landmark book which led to much experimentation and a

broad range of educational programs in the 1960's. Howard Gardner and other young researchers worked under Bruner and were much-influenced by his work. In the early 70's Bruner left Harvard to teach at University of Oxford for several years (1972 - 1979). He returned to Harvard in 1979.

Later he joined the New York University of Law, where he is a senior research fellow (at the age of 93).

Theory

Bruner was one of the founding fathers of constructivist theory.Constructivism is a broad conceptual framework with numerous perspectives, and Bruner's is only one. Bruner's theoretical framework is based on the theme that learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon existing knowledge. Learning is an active process. Facets of the process include selection and transformation of information, decision making, generating hypotheses, and making meaning from information and experiences.

Bruner's theories emphasize the significance of categorization in learning. "To perceive is to categorize, to conceptualize is to categorize, to learn is to form categories, to make decisions is to categorize." Interpreting information and experiences by similarities and differences is a key concept.

Bruner was influenced by Piaget's ideas about cognitive development in children. During the 1940's his early work focused on the impact of needs, motivations, & expectations (“mental sets”) and their influence on perception. He also looked at the role of strategies in the process of human categorization, and development of human cognition. He presented the point of view that children are active problem-solvers and capable of exploring “difficult subjects”. This was widely divergent from the dominant views in education at the time, but found an audience.

Four Key themes emerged in Bruner's early work: Bruner emphasized the role of structure in learning and how it may be made central in teaching. Structure refers to relationships among factual elements and techniques. See the section on categorization, below.

He introduced the ideas of "readiness for learning" and spiral curriculum. Bruner believed that any subject could be taught at any stage of development in a way that fit the child's cognitive abilities. Spiral curriculum refers to the idea of revisiting basic ideas over and over, building upon them and elaborating to the level of full understanding and mastery.

Bruner believed that intuitive and analytical thinking should both be encouraged and rewarded. He believed the intuitive skills were under-emphasized and he reflected on the ability of experts in every field to make intuitive leaps.

He investigated motivation for learning. He felt that ideally, interest in the subject matter is the best stimulus for learning. Bruner did not like external competitive goals such as grades or class ranking.

Eventually Bruner was strongly influenced by Vygotsky's writings and began to turn away from the intrapersonal focus he had had for learning, and began to adopt a social and political view of learning. Bruner argued that aspects of cognitive performance are facilitated by language. He stressed the importance of the social setting in the acquisition of language. His views are similar to those of Piaget, but he places more emphasis on the social influences on development. The earliest social setting is the mother-child dyad, where children work out the meanings of utterances to which they are repeatedly exposed. Bruner identified several important social devices including joint attention, mutual gaze, and turn-taking.

Bruner also incorporated Darwinian thinking into his basic assumptions about learning. He believed it was necessary to refer to human culture and primate evolution in order to understand growth and development. He did, however, believe there were individual differences and that no standard sequence could be found for all learners. He considered instruction as an effort to assist or shape growth. In 1996 he published The Culture of Education... This book reflected his changes in viewpoints since the 1960's. He adopted the point of view that culture shapes the mind and provides the raw material with which we constrict our world and our self-conception.

Four features of Bruner's theory of instruction. 1. Predisposition to learn.... This feature specifically states the experiences which move the learner toward a love of learning in general, or of learning something in particular. Motivational, cultural, and personal factors contribute to this. Bruner emphasized social factors and early teachers and parents' influence on this. He believed learning and problem solving emerged out of exploration. Part of the task of a teacher is to maintain and direct a child's spontaneous explorations.

2. Structure of knowledge....it is possible to structure knowledge in a way that enables the learner to most readily grasp the information. This is a relative feature, as there are many ways to structure a body of knowledge and many preferences among learners. Bruner offered considerable detail about structuring knowledge.

Understanding the fundamental structure of a subject makes it more comprehensible. Bruner viewed categorization as a fundamental process in the structuring of knowledge. (See the section below on categorization.)

Details are better retained when placed within the contest of an ordered and structured pattern.

To generate knowledge which is transferable to other contexts, fundamental principles or patterns are best suited.

The discrepancy between beginning and advanced knowledge in a subject area is diminished when instruction centers on a structure and principles of orientation. This means that a body of knowledge must be in a simple enough form for the learner to understand it and it must be in a form recognizable to the student's experience.

3. Modes of representation: visual, words, symbols.

4. Effective sequencing- no one sequencing will fit every learner, but in general, increasing difficulty. Sequencing, or lack of it, can make learning easier or more difficult. Form and pacing of reinforcement

Categorization:

Bruner gave much attention to categorization of information in the construction of internal cognitive maps. He believed that perception, conceptualization, learning, decision making, and making inferences all involved categorization.

Bruner suggested a system of coding in which people form a hierarchical arrangement of related categories. Each successively higher level of categories becomes more specific, echoing Benjamin Bloom's understanding of knowledge acquisition as well as the related idea of instructional scaffolding (Bloom's Taxonomy).

Categories are "rules" that specify four thing about objects.

1. Criterial attributes - required characteristics for inclusion of an object in a category. (Example, for an object to be included in the category "car" it must have an engine, 4 wheels, and be a possible means of transportation,

2. The second rule prescribes how the criteral attributes are combined.

3. The third rule assignees weight to various properties. (Example, it could be a car even if a tire was missing, and if it was used for hauling cargo it would be shifted to a different category of "truck" or perhaps "van".

4. The fourth rule sets acceptance limits on attributes. Some attributes can vary widely, such as color. Others are fixed. For example a vehicle without an engine is not a car. Likewise, a vehicle with only two wheels would not be included in "car".

There a several kinds of categories:

Identity categories - categories include objects based on their attributes or features.

Equivalent categories (provide rules for combining categories. Equivalence can be determined by affective criteria, which render objects equivalent by emotional reactions, functional criteria, based on related functions (for example, "car", "truck", "van" could all be combined in an inclusive category called "motor vehicle"), or by formal criteria, for example by science, law, or cultural agreement. For example, and apple is still an apple whether it is green, ripe, dried, etc (identity). It is food (functional), and it is a member of a botanical classification group (formal).

Coding systems are categories serve to recognize sensory input. They are major organizational variables in higher cognitive functioning. Going beyond immediate sensory data involves making inferences on the basis of related categories. Related categories form a "coding system." These are hierarchical arrangements of related categories. Bruner's theories introduced the idea that people interpret the world largely in terms of similarities and differences.

This is a significant contribution to how individuals construct their unique models of the world.

Application

Bruner emphasized four characteristics of effective instruction which emerged from his theoretical constructs.

1. Personalized: instruction should relate to learners' predisposition, and facilitate interest toward learning,

2. Content Structure: content should be structured so it can be most easily grasped by the learner

3. Sequencing: sequencing is an important aspect for presentation of material

4. Reinforcement: rewards and punishment should be selected and paced appropriately.

Intellectual Development

Bruner postulated three stages of intellectual development.

The first stage he termed "Enactive", when a person learns about the world through actions on physical objects and the

outcomes of these actions.

The second stage was called "Iconic" where learning can be obtained through using models and pictures.

The final stage was "Symbolic" in which the learner develops the capacity to think in abstract terms. Based on this three-stage notion, Bruner recommended using a combination of concrete, pictorial then symbolic activities will lead to more effective learning. http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/constructivism/bruner.html

Constructivism is an epistemological belief about what "knowing" is and how one "come to know." Contructivists believe in individual interpretations of the reality, i.e. the knower and the known are interactive and inseparable.Constructivism rejects the notions that

1. Knowledge is an identifiable entity with absolute truth value2. Meaning can be passed on to learners via symbols or transmission3. Learners can incorporate exact copies of teacher's understanding for their own use4. The whole concepts can be broken into discrete sub-skills, and that concepts can be taught out of context.

Constructivism, with focus on social nature of cognition, suggests an approach that1. Gives learners the opportunity for concrete, contextually meaningful experience through which they can search

for patterns, raise their own questions, and construct their own models.2. Facilitates a community of learners to engage in activity, discourse, and reflection3. Encourages students to take on more ownership of the ideas, and to pursue autonomy, mutual reciprocity of

social relations, and empowerment to be the goals.Who are primary contributors? Perkins (1992) pointed out the origins of the constructivism:"Constructivism has multiple roots in psychology and philosophy of this century: the developmental perspective of Jean Piaget, the emergence of cognitive psychology under the guidance of such figures as Jerome Bruner and Ulric Neisser, the constructivist perspective of philosophers such as Nelson Goodman."This knowledge base will discuss particular the major influence from the field of cognitive science, i.e. the work of Piaget and Bruner, as well as from the work of socio-historical psychologists, such as Vygotsky.Piaget (Also see Cognitivism)Piaget's theory is fundamental to cognitivism and to constructivism. His central idea is that "knowledge proceeds neither solely from the experience of objects nor from an innate programming performed in the subject but from successive constructions." (Fosnot, 1996). Piaget (1985) proposed that the mechanism of learning is the process of equilibration, in which cognitive structure assimilates and accommodates to generate new possibilities when it is disturbed based on human's self-organizing tendency.Lev VygotskyVygotsky's sociohistorical development psychology focuses on the dialectic between the individual and society, and the effect of social interaction, language, and culture on learning. To Vygotsky (1978), learning is a continual movement from the current intellectual level to a higher level which more closely approximates the learner's potential. This movement occurs in the so-called "zone of proximal development" as a result of social interaction. Thus, an understanding of human thinking depends in turn on an understanding of the mechanism of social experience; the force of the cognitive process deriving from the social interaction is emphasized. Also, the role of the adult and the learners' peers as they conversed, questioned, explained, and negotiated meaning is emphasized.Vygostky's Sociohistorical Learning Theory or Sociocultural theoryVygotsky was disappointed with the overwhelming control of environment over human behavior that is represented in behaviorism. Vygotsky (1978) objected to any tendency to equate human beings with animals on the basis of innate reflexes and conditional reflexes. He recognized the higher psychological functions of humans, especially the distinguishing mental process of signification by which humans assign meanings to arbitrary stimuli and with which human learning is determined by the social and historical context. He believed that human development and learning occur through their interactions with the environment and the other people in it.

Three themes that form the core of Vygotsky's theoretical framework: (Wertsch, 1992)1. A reliance on a genetic or developmental method:

Vygotsky (1978) recognized two basic processes operating continuously at every level of human activity: internalization and externalization. Vygotsky proposed that even though every complex mental function is first an interaction between people, it subsequently becomes a process within individuals. It is the transition from the external operation to internal development which undergoes qualitative changes. This transformation involves the mastery of external means of thinking and learning to use symbols to control and regulate one's thinking.

2. The claim that higher mental processes in the individual have their origin in social processes.The concept of Zone of Proximal Development: to Vygotsky, learning is a continual movement from the current intellectual level to a higher level which more closely approximates the learner's potential. This movement occurs in the so-called "zone of proximal development" as a result of social interaction. The zone of proximal development is the distance between the actual independent development level and the potential development level under the guidance of or in collaboration with peers (Vygotsky, 1978). Vygotsky believes that human mental activity is a particular case of social experience. Thus, an understanding of human thinking depends in turn on an understanding of the mechanism of social experience; the force of the cognitive process deriving from the social interaction is emphasized.

3. Mediation: the claim is that mental processes can be understood only if we understand the tools and signs that mediate them. Changing a stimulus situation in the process of responding to it establishes mediation, e.g. the gesture of pointing could not have been established as a sign without the reaction of the other person. This also implies that any higher mental function necessarily goes through an external stage in its development because it is initially a social function.

Implications to learning and instruction:1. Learning in authentic context:

The conception of mediation gives the emphasis to the interaction between individuals and the historical and cultural development. Situate learners in an authentic context, in which learners construct via dialectical relations among people acting, the contexts of their activity, and the activity itself.

2. Providing Scaffolding: Learning takes place in the social interaction with older, more learned members of the society: learning occurs when individual is prompted to move past current levels of performance and develop new abilities. Thus, provide external support from the instructor, peers, experts, artifacts or tools as the learners construct knowledge.

BrunerA major theme of Bruner's construction theory is that learning is an active process in which learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge. The learner selects and transforms information, constructs hypotheses, and makes decisions, relying on a cognitive structure, e.g. schema and mental models, to do so. The interconnection of the new experience with the prior knowledge results in the reorganization of the cognitive structure, which creates meaning and allows the individual to "go beyond the information given".According to TIP's (Theory Into Practice database) abstract of Bruner's theory, the principles of instruction based on Bruner include:

1. Readiness: Instruction must be concerned with the experiences and contexts that make the student willing and able to learn

2. Spiral organization: Instruction must be structured so that it can be easily grasped by the student3. Going beyond the information given: Instruction should be designed to facilitate extrapolation and or fill in the

gapsBruner's Constructive LearningBruner (1986) claims that constructivism began with Kant's concepts of a priori knowledge, which focuses on the importance of prior knowledge (what we know) to what we perceive from out interactions with the environment. Jonassen (1991) described Kant's ideas of individual construction of reality: " Kant believed in the external, physical world (noumena), but we know it only through our sensation (phenomena) - how the world appears to us."TIP(Theory Into Practice database) described that Bruner's major theoretical framework is that learning is an active process in which learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge. In other words, Learning is an active, social process in which students construct new ideas or concepts based on current knowledge. The student selects information, originates hypotheses, and makes decisions in the process of integrating experiences

into their existing mental constructs.What are Bruner's key concepts? (Driscoll, 2000)

1. Three Modes of presenting understandingo Enactive representation, a mode of representing past events through appropriate motor responseso Iconic representation, which enables the perceiver to "summarize events by organization of percepts

and of imageso Symbolic representation, "a symbol system which represents things by design features that can be

arbitrary and remote, e.g. language

2. Different from a fixed sequence of developmental stages, Bruner emphasizes the influences from the environment on amplification of the internal capabilities that learners possess.

Bruner's readiness Piaget's readiness Ausubel's readinessReadiness of the subject matter for the learner: how to match instruction to the child's dominant mode of thinking

Cognitive readiness of the learner to understand the logical operations in a subject matter

Appropriateness in terms of the child's prior knowledge, i.e. what she knows and how she structure that knowledge in memory

Different from Piaget's cognitive development, which proposed that the qualitative difference in thinking is a stage-like development, Bruner's concept is that whereas symbolic representation is likely to be used for learning something new in a familiar topic; learners of all ages may resort to enactive or iconic representation when they encounter unfamiliar materials. Thus, to determine what mode of representation will be optimal for instruction requires knowing something about the learner's prior knowledge and dominant modes of thinking.

3. Schooling as an instrument of culture. Knowing is a process, not a product. Children should be accepted as members and participants in the culture and provide opportunities to make and remake the culture in each generation.

Bruner (1966) states that a theory of instruction should address four major aspects:1. Predisposition towards learning2. The ways in which a body of knowledge can be structured so that it can be most readily grasped by the learner3. The most effective sequences in which to present material4. The nature and pacing of rewards and punishments..

Bruner's influence on instruction Spiral Curriculum: Translating material into children's modes of thought: presenting topics consistent with

children's forms of thought at an early age and then reintroducing those topics again later in a different form Interpersonal interaction is a means that enable learners to develop cognitive growth: questioning, prompting Discovery learning: discovery as" all forms of obtaining knowledge for oneself by the use of one's own mind"

Students need to determine what variables are relevant, what information should be sought about those variables, and when the information is obtained, what should be done with it.Discovery of a concept proceeds from a systematic comparison of instances for what distinguishes examples from non-examples. To promote concept discovery, the teacher presents the set of instances that will best help learners to develop an appropriate model of the concept.Contrast that lead to cognitive conflicts can set the stage for discovery

Variables in instruction: nature of knowledge, nature of the knower, and nature of the knowledge-getting process

Promote discovery in the exercise of problem solving Feedback must be provided in a mode that is both meaningful and within the information-processing capacity

of the learner. Intrinsic pleasure of discovery promote a sense of self-reward

von GlasersfeldVon Glasersfeld development of the epistemological basis of the psychological variant incorporates both the Piagetian

notion of assimilation and accommodation and the cybernetic concept of viability (Cobb, 1994). The value of knowledge no longer lies in its conveyance of truth, but its viability in individual experience. Von Glasersfeld (1992) stated that "Truths are replaced by viable models, and viability is always relative to a chosen goal." Similar to Piaget, von Glasersfeld sees learning as an active process of self-organization in which the individual eliminate 'perturbation' (disequlibrium in Piaget's term) from the interaction with others as well as an active construction of viable knowledge adapted from the interaction with others. Individuals' construction of their ways of knowing is the focus of von Glaserfeld. But, he also recognizes the importance of social interaction as a process of meaning negotiation in this subjective construction of knowing.What does it mean to learning?Constructivism, applied as an explanatory framework of learning, describes how the learner constructs knowledge from experience, which makes it unique to each individual. Points of view of constructivism bring forth two major trends of explaining how leaning occurs: cognitive constructivists, focusing on the individual cognitive construction of mental structures; sociocultural constructivists, emphasizing the social interaction and cultural practice on the construction of knowledge. Both trends believe that:

1. Knowledge cannot exist independently from the knower; knowledge cannot be reproduced and transmitted to another person.

2. Learning is viewed as self-regulatory process:o Cognitive constructivists focus on the active mental construction struggling with the conflict between

existing personal models of the world, and incoming information in the environment.o Sociocultural constructivists emphasis the process of enculturation into a community of practice, in

which learners construct their models of reality as a meaning-making undertaking with culturally developed tools and symbols (Vygotsky, 1978), and negotiate such meaning thorough cooperative social activity, discourse and debate (Von Glaserfeld, 1992)

3. Learners are active in making sense of things instead of responding to stimuli. Unlike information processor taking in and storing up information, learners " make tentative interpretations of experience and go on to elaborate and test those interpretations"(Perkins, 1992)

Impacts on Instructional DesignConstructivism provides different views of learning. Learners are no longer passive recipients and reproducers of information. Learners are active constructors of their own conceptual understanding, and active meaning makers interacting with the physical and social world. The design of learning environment based on constructivist view of learning emphasizes the integration of three types of human experiences (Vygotsky, 1978): historical experience, e.g. the traditions and practices of a culture, social experience, and adaptation experience, in which people engage in active adaptation, changing the environment.Below are some general principles of learning derived form constructivism (Smith and Ragan, 2000; Driscoll, 2001; Duffy & Jonassen, 1992):

Learning requires invention and self-organization on the part of learners Disequilibrium facilitates learning: Errors need to be perceived as a result of learners' conceptions and

therefore not minimized or avoided. Thus, challenge students with open-ended investigations in realistic, meaningful contexts need to be offered; allow learners to explore and generate many possibilities, both affirming and contradictory.

Reflective abstraction is the driving force of learning: As meaning-makers, humans seek to organize and generalize across experiences in a representational form

Dialogue within a community engenders further thinking: the learners are responsible for defending, proving, justifying, and communicating their ideas to the classroom community.

Principles of designing learning environmentJonassen (1996) proposed that learning environments should provide active, intentional, complex, contextualized, reflective, conversational, collaborative, and constructive learning.

Image from David Jonassen's siteDriscoll (2000) listed constructivist principles for designing learning:

Embed learning in complex, realistic and relevant environments Provide a social negotiation as an integral part of learning Support multiple perspectives and the use of multiple modes of representation Encourage ownership in learning Nurture self-awareness of the knowledge construction process

About design of instructionBased on Jonassen (1992) and Driscoll (2000), constructivism has the following impacts on instructional design:

1. Instructional goals and objectives would be negotiated not imposed2. Task analysis would concentrate more on considering appropriate interpretations and providing the intellectual

tools that are necessary for helping learners to construct knowledge3. Designers would provide generative, mental construction tool kits embedded in relevant learning environments

that facilitate knowledge construction by learners4. About evaluation:

Since constructivism does not hold the that the function of instruction is to transmit knowledge that mirrors the reality and its structures to the learner's mind, criterion-referenced evaluation, which is based on predetermined objective standards, is not an appropriate evaluation tool to constructivistic environments (Jonassen, 1992). The focus of evaluation should be placed on the process of knowledge construction rather than the end products of learning. And even if the end results are evaluated, it should emphasize the higher order thinking of human being.

The evaluation of learning focus on the higher order thinking, the knowledge construction process, and the building of the awareness of such process.

The context of evaluation should be embedded in the authentic tasks and meaningful real-world context. The criteria of evaluation should represent multiple perspectives in learning environment. From the perspective

of socio-cultural constructivist, since "no objective reality is uniformly interpretable by all learners, then assessing the acquisition of such reality is not possible" (Jonassen, 1992). Thus, the evaluation should focus on the learning process rather than the product.

Portfolio evaluation: different student interpretation at different stages in their learning process. Learning is multifaceted and multiperspectival, so as the results of learning.

The function of evaluation is not in the reinforcement or behavior control tool but more of "a self-analysis and metacognitive tool".

References:Bruner, J. (1986). Actual Minds, Possible Worlds. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Driscoll, M. P. (2000). Psychology of learning for instruction. 2nd ed. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.Cobb, P. (1994). Where is the Mind? Constructivist and sociocultural perspectives on mathematic

development. Educational Researcher, 23 (7), pp. 13-20Fosnot, C. T. (1996). (Ed.) Constructivism: Theory, perspectives, and practice. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.Driscoll, M. C. (2000). Psychology of learning for instruction. 2nd edition. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.Jonassen, D. H. (1992). Evaluating constructivist learning. In T. M. Duffy, & D. H. Jonassen (eds), Constructivism and the technology of instruction: A conversation. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Association.Piaget, J. (1985). The equilibration of cognitive structures. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Smith, P. L., & Ragan, T. J. (1999). Instructional Design. 2nd ed. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.Von Glaserfeld (1992). Constructivism reconstruction: A reply to Suchting. Science and Education, 1, 379-384.Vyogtsky, L. S. (1979). Consciousness as a problem in the psychology of behavior.Soviet Psychology, 17 (4), 3-35. (Original work published in 19-24).Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychology process. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (Original published in 1930).Wertsch, J. V. (1992). L. S. Vygotsky and contemporary developmental psychology. Developmental Psychology, 28 *4), 548-557. Vygotsky, L. (1986). Thought and language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (Original work published 1962).

Source:http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/w/x/wxh139/construct.htm