' Edward Tolman '. What is a cognitive map?
Gagne (1985) 5 major domains of human capabilities relating to learning.
Intellectual skills
Learning discrimination, rules and concepts hierarchical Concepts involve responding to similarities
knowledge - whether gained from text or pictures.
Affective predisposition's to make certain choices or to behave in certain ways. Important motivational value. Hard to teach - modelling (Bandura) by the teacher, best way, even though you can not control all other influences, outside the school.
Execution of controlled sequences e.g. muscular movements. Reinforcement important e.g. seeing the text produced whilst learning to word process.
Metacognitive and cognitive skills
Look at table 6.1
Summary of above points and how the teacher can help develop these domains
We construct using past knowledge rather than
just discover.
Learner is a processor of information
Declarative knowledge - facts that have been learnt.
Procedural knowledge - knowing how to do something
Meaning depends on forging relationships
Use the balloons popped example p155/6
The picture activates a number of schema.
e.g. Understanding of balloons filled with a light gas
electrical amplification
relationships (human)
Scripts (Schank and Abelson, 1977) - an order of doing things in a certain
situation. (e.g. putting on clothes). Can also be how to behave in a certain
situation (e.g. in restaurant).
Concepts ( Bruner says 'Category') derive from abstractions
derive implicit rules - categorise the world
'Coding System' - relationships
LTM - highly associonistic.
Piaget
- child interacts with environment to assimilate and accommodate.
Learner - 'Constructs' - knowledge
Make our own versions of reality
Discover our own meanings
schools should foster the discovery of relationships.
Teacher presents information, not in its final form, but are required to
organise it themselves.
(see an example of a coding system in fig 6.2)
Less teacher involvement. Teachers offer guidance.
Teachers need to get the balance between over or under guidance.
Discovery approach, claims Bruner , facilitates.
Bruner - 4 sets of conditions contribute to discovery learning
Predisposition to react in certain ways.
discovery-oriented person - looks for relationships
Teachers can influence set by instruction.
e.g.. Students told to memorise. 'Surface approach' or students asked to find
relationships 'deep approach'.
Level of arousal - moderate being best.
- knowledge of specific, relevant information.
Bruner argues that discovery learning is most likely to occur when the
individual is well prepared.
Wider the information the individual has the more likely relationships are to
be found.
approaching teaching / learning using many different methods - approaching information from all different perspectives.
Based on Bruner 's ideas
' Constructivist
' approach - students should construct knowledge for themselves.
'Conceptual change movement' - present ideas that challenge the learner -
present problems and puzzles, - reorganisation of knowledge (conceptual change)
Class exercise - primary school children given an area to explore - are
asked where they would establish a settlement - learn that settlements need to
be near rivers/harbours.
Can the principle of the combustion engine (read car engine) be discovered?
More on Bruner
Ausubel would see Bruner's recommendations as wasteful of teaching time -
discovery learning does take time. He would appreciate that if discoveries are
made, teaching would be effective.
Ausubel is naturally against meaningless learning by rote. Instead, his theory
demands that material, to be learnt, is structured.
Meaning is brought about by establishing a relationship between old and new
material. [Cognitive structure].
Cognitive structures - hierarchically organised concepts (subsumers) similar to
Bruner 's coding system (see figure 6.2, p158).
Subsumers - (comes from the word subsume) - subsume material to existing
cognitive material.
[definition of subsume: to classify within a larger category or under a general
principle].
Derivative subsumption - deriving material from pre-existing structure.
Correlative subsumption - an extension of what is already known.
Forgetting, or loss of ability to recall is seen as the inability to dissociate
new material from the old - obliterative subsumption.
Teachers need to use advance organisers - highly generic
concepts presented before the lesson. Place the new material in the context of
the old - bring to mind, previous material and clarify the relationship between
new and old material.
Ausubel -
Students will use information that they have discovered rather than
information that has been taught.
Ausubel believes that after the age of 11 - discovery approaches are a waste of
time. Learner has enough background material by then.
Scientific comparisons between 'discovery' and 'receptive' approaches full of
methodological problems.
- half the studies on effectiveness of organisers say they are effective, half say not.
good teacher should use both methods
key to successful learning is organisation of material.
Cognitive apprenticeship (Collins, Brown & Mewman, 1989).
Advocates - modelling, coaching, scaffolding, fading, articulation and
reflection.
Sequencing
Misconceptions can inhibit learning as the cognitive structure will not allow
the logical subsumption of new material.
Good examples -p170 e.g. The world is round - flat round like a plate or like a
goldfish bowl with the earth at the bottom and filled with air?
Bloom (1984) points out that one to one tutorials are the most effective means
of teaching. Our aim should be to treat a classroom as if it were a tutorial.
But how?
Alexander and Judy (1988)
Rosenshine and Stevens (1986) put forward 9 tips for teachers see p172.
Warning - only really appropriate for well-structured content. Not so good for
morality, ethics, creative writing, politics, etc.
Situated Cognition (Greeno, Collins & Resnick, 1996)
Distributed Expertise/Cognition
Knowledge is not in the heads of individuals it is distributed in
Knowledge is the property of both individuals and groups we belong to.
Rodin’s thinker – statue- thinking is serious, solitary, hard, and not fun.
A group of students happily engaged with a computer are thinking as well and they are having fun.
Out
In
Ongoing Research
Research into teaching writing, mathematics and general academic work using the above method has been conducted and the initial results are positive, but it is hard to develop and sustain such communities.
Problem-Based Project Learning
There are no ‘correct’ answers
Authentic, real-life problem solving is worked on collaboratively or alone.
For example, a field trip to the sea to analyse pollution or trying to find out if there is any evidence of full moons producing ‘lunacy’.
Students learn:
School resembles life
Computer simulations of micro-worlds. For example, the effect of medical advances on population growth or the effect of economic policies on economic growth.
Advantages
Formal instruction and real experience in problem solving produces better problem solvers (Black, 1994)
Also motivation is increased
Page numbers refer to 'Psychology for Teaching' 8th Ed. by Guy R. Lefrancois, published by Wadsworth.
Vygotsky
Bruner's Beyond the information
given
The Unsuccessful
Adolescent
Cognitive
Development
Piaget
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