Multiple Perspectives

Question 1

Cognitive Science 3 Key Ideas

Answer 1

o Learning is constructive and not receptive
Experts knowledge is connected around important concepts
o New focus on importance of prior knowledge
o Mental frameworks (schemata) organize memory and guide thought. This shifts importance to prior knowledge of the learner
o Active learning requires that students use metacognitive strategies
o Motivation and beliefs can affect learning.

Question 2

Information-Processing Theory

Answer 2

• Humans are metaphorically like computers
• Information comes in a stimuli, then reaches sensory register (moment of perception), working memory and is stored in long-term memory. Information can be retrieved from long-term memory and returned to working memory.
• Executive processes regulate the flow of information (for example, rehearsal can keep information in working memory)
• Attention is limited, we can only attend to a few items at a time. Refers to a limited resource that allows for maintaining mental processes

Question 3

Flavell (1979)

Answer 3

Metacognition:•Young children do relatively little monitoring of their own learning
• Metacognition is important for oral comprehension, reading, attention, memory, problem solving etc. • Children may begin by distinguishing only between understanding and not-understanding and slowly develop greater nuance
• Propose that metacognition can be taught and can aid learning

Question 4

Bandura (1986)

Answer 4

Social Cognitive theory• Triadic reciprocal relationship between behavior, cognition and other personal factors and environment which all interact with each other

Question 5

Ernest (2010)

Answer 5

• Metaphor of building from carpentry. All knowledge is built, so previous “blocks” were also built in prior learning
• Knowledge is not passively received but is actively built. Knowing is individual and personal and is always built from pre-existing knowledge

Question 6

Von Glaserfeld (2005)

Answer 6

• Key idea of constructivism came from Piaget—that knowledge does not have an objective reality, but instead has an adaptive (responds to environment) function

Question 7

Vygotsky (1978)

Answer 7

• Speech is important for higher-level processing and children use speech to problem solve.
• Memory moves beyond biological capacity when signs are used (eg colored cards in games)
• What a child can do with assistance may be better indicator of potential. ZPD difference between what child does independently and with assistance

Question 8

Gee (2008)

Answer 8

• Opportunity to learn (OTL) has traditionally mean the learners are exposed to the same content
• However, cognitive theories of learning stress prior knowledge. Thus without similar prior knowledge, students can’t have same OTL

Question 9

Brown et al. (1989)

Answer 9

Situated learning theory:
• Classroom activity takes place within the culture of schools and is not in fact the culture of historians, writers etc. They are not activities used by the practioners and are therefore not “authentic” activities and represent only the culture of schooling itself
• Recommend “cognitive apprenticeship” model which tries to introduce students to authentic practice-practices that are ordinary to a culture (what would a historian actually do?)
• Learning best takes place in group “community of learners” engaged in a joint problem solving.