Constructivism

In this section, I present an overview of the theory of constructivism. The page contains the following parts:

1. Constructivism inforgraphic
2. Zone of proximal development and scaffolding
3. A learning scenario that applies constructivism

Part 1: Constructivism infographic

Constructivism purports that mental processes can actually be understood and moreover, they have a hierarchy. When we humans learn, we constantly try to make connections between old and new knowledge, building on what we already know (hence the term “constructivism”). Basically, we create our own subjective reality through our reasoning and experience.

According to constructivism, learning is, and should be active. Teachers should view students as individuals who have their own disposition and pre-conditioned knowledge, they then should look to build upon that. Furthermore, some experts now hold that learning is not only active but also social, giving birth the sub-field of social constructivism.

Part 2: Zone of proximal development and scaffolding

If we view the universe of tasks as consisting of things that students can do on their own (green) and things that are clearly out of reach of the students (orange), then the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD for short) is the yellow area between the two. That is to say, ZPD is the collection of tasks lying just outside of students’ comfort zone, but not too far out that students have no chance of tackling. This concept was popularized by Vygotsky in his 1978 paper “Interaction between learning and development”.

The job of teachers in this framework is to help students transition successfully from the green to the yellow area. This will expand students’ abilities and in effect, creating a new ZPD and continuing the learning process. We can see here the idea of constructivism: each student has his or her own green area and corresponding yellow area (ZPD), and they have to expand their knowledge and skills based on, and encompassing the green areas.

The activities or contents that are used to support students in such transition is usually called “scaffolds”. These are not meant to give students the “whole spill” of knowledge and skills, but only to give students a little “nudge”. The “nudge” should be enough to help effortful students make the jump from the green to the yellow area.

Part 3: A learning scenario which applies constructivism

We can continue with the example I have built for behaviorism, namely, students in a classroom learning multiplication. Suppose that by using techniques of behaviorism, the teacher has successfully trained students to correctly multiply 2 single – digit numbers, the task now is to expand this to multiplying a 2 – digit number with a 1 – digit number.

Now, the teacher can use the same technique all over again, which means reinforcing the correct association between each pair of numbers (say 20 and 5) and their product (100 in this case). However, having been trained in the theory of constructivism and ZPD, she decided to help students discover the rules by themselves with only a little help. She began by dividing students into groups and giving each group a sample calculation. Students can break down the multiplication into summation and find the results. The teacher then aggregates results from the groups and begins asking a series of questions so that by answering, students can slowly see the patterns for themselves. After the questioning, the teacher can summarize the answer of students and consolidate to correct rules of multiplication. The students then work individually on practice questions.

References

David L, “Constructivism,” in Learning Theories, June 20, 2015, https://www.learning-theories.com/constructivism.html.

Mourat Tchoshanov (2013), Engineering of elearning: conceptualizing e – Didactics, UNESCO institute for Information Technologies in Education.

McLeod, S. A. (2019). What Is the Zone of Proximal Development? Retrieved from https://www.simplypsychology.org/Zone-of-Proximal-Development.html [June 28, 2019]

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Interaction between learning and development. In Gauvain & Cole (Eds). Readings on the Development of Children. New York: Scientific American Books, pp. 34 – 40.