Constructivism (2006-06-19)

A beautiful mind map from someone at Bergen University in Norway which nicely sums up educational constructivism

Historical context of constructivism:

• Immanuel Kant 1724-1804
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who strongly influenced modern educational theory through his book Emile: Or, On Education
• John Dewey
• Jean Piaget
• Lev Vygotsky
  
• Jerome Bruner

Constructivism has grown out of or extended cognitive psychology and social psychology and is anti behaviorist psychology.

Its core idea is that knowledge and thinking are generated internally by each individual to give meaning to the world. One implication is that knowledge is not absolute truth that imposes itself onto the mind from outside, but rather that each individual has synthesised their own knowledge. Knowledge is therefore relative and falable (not always true). Post Modernism's rejection of absolute truth and its emphasis on meaning being dependent on the audience seems to me to be a variation on constructivism.

The implication for education is that the presentation of 'information' will be minimally effective unless the student finds it meaningful, works with it because they are interested, talks about it with their peers and is engaged by it.

Constructivism, arising out of coginitive and social psychology has two different flavours - the Piagetian/Bruner individual focussed, stage based flavour and the Vygotskian group based, social construction of reality flavour.

With its historical association with an assortment of (small l) liberals and Socialists, along with its anti Behaviourist bent, constructivism is more at home on the left side of politics than the right. It is about empowering individuals and groups to be creative and self determining. It is NOT about making carbon copy model citizens who obey authority without thought. It's bottom-up style has a grass roots feel that encourages individuality as oposed to the authoritarian top-down approach it contrasts itself with. It is not only descriptive about development, it also prescribes rich experiences, playfulness and an active mind as being healthy and a very good thing.

Some concerns:
A true constructivist pedagogy is scary in that it involves 'letting go' and trusting that the students will actually go somewhere 'useful' - even if it is not where the teacher would have intended. The size of the commitment to ensure the right scaffolding is in place seems large. The cost of having enough peers and mentors to make a decent ZPD also could be large. How does one measure or report on the progress of students? Does one need to? How does this clash with the expectations of parents?

My experience in the classroom and workshop is that even quite rich tasks which are exciting and engaging the majority of students still often leave a significant minority cold - They sit on the sidelines and fade into the background. The underlying reasons vary widely, but the question for me is finding the balance between accepting and allowing that some students may choose to do nothing and making some sort of attempt to coerce them to participate (which is slipping back into the top down mode?).


Sources:
http://www.uib.no/People/sinia/CSCL/web_struktur-836.htm
Wikipedia Constructivism
http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/cogsys/construct.html
List of constructivist sites here