Social constructivism

Social Constructivism

1. Social Constructivism by
Lev Vygotsky
Dr. Manju N. D
Assistant Professor
SVK National College of Education,
BalarajursRoad, NES Campus, Shivamogga.
Email:[email protected]

2. Social Constructivism by Lev Vygotsky
•Lev Vygotsky'sconstructivist theory, which is
often called Social Constructivism.
•Acordingto Lev VygotskyCulture gives the child
the cognitive tools needed for development.
•Adults such as parents and teachers are conduits
for the tools of the culture, including language.
•The tools culture provides a child include cultural
history, social context, and language.
•Today they also include electronic forms of
information access.

3. What is Social Constructivism?
•Emphasizes the importance of culture and
context in understanding what occurs in
society and constructing knowledge based on
this understanding .
•The study states that Culture plays a large role
in the cognitive development of a person. Its
origins are largely attributed to Lev Vygotsky.

4. Assumptions
•Knowledge is a product of human interaction.
•Knowledge is socially and culturally
constructed that is influenced by the group
and it’s environment.
•Learning is a social activity.

5. Examples of Social Constructivist
Classroom Activities
•Social Constructivism: Whole Language
•Social Constructivism: Collaborative learning
•Social Constructivism: Situated Learning
•Social Constructivism: Anchored Instruction
•Social Constructivism: Games, Simulations,
Cases, and Problem Solving

6. Social Constructivism:
•Whole Language :
•Whole language approaches tend to emphasize
writing about what the child already knows and
can explain verbally.
•Early "writing" activities, for example, might
involve the child describing his or her
neighborhood and the teacher writing what the
child says on a large piece of paper.

7. •Collaborative Learning:
•Learning is promoted through collaboration --
collaboration among students, and between
students and teacher.
•As students share background knowledge and
participate in the give and take of collaborative
and cooperative activities they are actually
negotiating meaning. They are building
knowledge, not as individuals, but as a group.

8. •Situated Learning:
•Students learn many things in school produces
"inert" knowledge -knowledge that can be used
to answer items on a school test but which is not
available to the student when he or she is trying
to solve a problem that requires that knowledge.
•More recently several theorists have argued that
a teaching content in an abstract, out of context
way results in inert knowledge.
•Situated learning proponents support both
problem solving and anchored instruction as
instructional strategies

9. •Anchored Instruction:
•The anchored instruction approach is an attempt to
help students become more actively engaged in
learning by situating or anchoring instruction around
an interesting topic.
•Principles of anchored instruction:
•Learning and teaching activities should be designed
around an "anchor" which is often a story,
adventure, or situation that includes a problem or
issue to be dealt with that is of interest to the
students.
•Instructional materials should include rich resources
students can explore as they try to decide how to
solve a problem (e.g., interactive videodisc
programs).

10. •Games, Simulations, Cases, and Problem
Solving
•All four of the instructional approaches
covered in this section involve students in
interesting, "real" activities. We say "real"
even though many games are clearly not
realistic.
•All of these approaches involve students in
learning about, playing in, or solving problems
in an environment that has rules or patterns.

11. Other things you can do:
•Encourage team working and collaboration
•Promote discussion or debates
•Set up study groups for peer learning
•Allocate a small proportion of grades for peer
assessment and train students in the process and
criteria
•Show students models of good practice in essay
writing and project work
•Be aware of your own role as a model of ‘the way
things are done...’be explicit about your
professional values and the ethical dimensions of
your subject

12. Implications of constructivism for
teaching and learning
•Teachers act as facilitators, supports, guides and models
of learning.
•Learning concerns adjusting our mental models to
accommodate new experiences.
•Learning concerns making connections between
information.
•Instruction should be built around more complex
problems, not problems with clear, correct answers.
•Context and personal knowledge have high significance.
•Students should help establish the criteria on which their
work is assessed.
•Teachers know more and shouldn’t let students muddle
around.

13. •Student learning depends on background
knowledge –that’s why teaching facts is so
necessary (reversed).
•Student interest and effort are more important than
textbook content.
•It is sometimes better for teachers, not students, to
decide what activities are to be done.
•Sense making and thinking are most important, not
knowing content.
•Experimentation replaces rote learning.
•Teaching utilisesboth skill-based and open-ended
approaches.
•Motivation to learn is intrinsic rather than extrinsic
(done for its own sake rather than for grades, test
scores or rewards).

14. •Learners often produce unique and personal
knowledge.
•immature beliefs are used as the starting
point for further discussion, exploration and
evaluation for development, rather than being
discounted as ‘wrong’.
•Learning for transfer is important.
•Learners learn best through finding and
generating their own knowledge.
•Discovery and guided discovery learning are
important.

15. •Exploration and active learning are important.
•Learning is collaborative and cooperative, not
just individual.
• Higher order thinking is significant.
• Classrooms become multidimensional, with
different activities at different levels taking
place simultaneously.

16. Constructivism is a learning theory

17. Constructivism is a learning theory
•Learning is an active process in which the learner
uses sensory input and constructs meaning out of
it.
•People learn to learn as they learn.
•The crucial action of constructing meaning is
mental.
•Learning involves language.
•Learning is a social activity.
•Learning is contextual.
•One needs knowledge to learn.
•It takes time to learn.
•Motivation is a key component in learning.

18. Characteristics of Constructivism
•1. Learners construct understanding Learners as
active thinkers who interpret new information
based on what they already know.
•2. New learning depends on current understanding
•3. Learning is facilitated by social interaction
Believes in creating a community of learners within
classrooms
•4. Meaningful learning occurs within authentic
learning task Involves constructing knowledge and
understanding that is so akin to the knowledge and
understanding needed when applied in the real
world

19. Thank you….