A Cognitive Model of Learning

Figure 1, made by the author from Sharon Derry's review of cognitive learning theory,
provides a starting place. Notes 11 - 12

Part of a working paper, Serving the Strategic Reader: Cognitive

Reading Theory and its Implications for the Teaching of Writing

by Gerald Grow, Ph.D.

Professor of Journalism
Florida A&M University
copyright © 1994, 1996

How to reference this publication

Figure 1. A Cognitive Model of Learning

[To continue the Short Tour, click here for a summary of this section.]

Steps in Figure 1 are discussed in the following section.

Steps 1-3. Comprehension

When faced with a new text, readers do not begin by "reading" in the sense of starting at
the first word and moving sequentially toward the last word, they first predict what the
passage will mean. Prediction, which plays a key role in Frank Smith's cogent account
of reading, can be understood as "the prior elimination of unlikely alternatives" or
"questions we ask the world." Note 13 Readers not only predict what an article will
contain or what a statement will mean, they predict:

 what prior knowledge will be relevant and

 which strategies will be useful in approaching the new text.

Such predictions may be simultaneous with the first decoding of the letters on the page,
and, since a reader can be led to know what to expect by illustrations, the nature of the
publication, or other contextual cues, such predictions may even precede reading. Most
of this activity is unconscious and appears to be part of the way we orient ourselves in
the world.

For example, a glance at the heading "Sports" in a section of the newspaper will cue one
reader to relax, settle in for a leisurely perusal of sports news, and begin remembering
what she already knows (The playoffs were held last night.), perhaps generating
questions (Who won the basketball playoffs?) or otherwise focusing attention,
knowledge, and reading strategies (what to skip, which teams to read about) onto the
new information (researchers call this activating relevant schemas).

Another reader may see the heading "Sports" and take it as a cue to skip that entire
section of the paper. Like all readers, these two are active and strategic: They actively
interpret what they read; they choose what to read and how deeply to read it.

Researchers use the word "comprehension" to label what takes place when the reader
connects the new information with prior knowledge. Information alone, no matter how
well written, does not create comprehension. Comprehension depends on the reader's
prior knowledge and reading strategies.

The sports fan has a large body of organized information about sports and can quickly
fit new information into this framework. Another reader, with a different body of
organized knowledge, may actively seek out a music review to find out how well a
visiting chamber group played the opening fugue of Beethoven's C-Sharp Minor
Quartet. Much information in the sports pages is incomprehensible to someone lacking
prerequisite knowledge of sports; much information in a music review is
incomprehensible to someone lacking prerequisite knowledge of music.

Even though both the sports report and the music review contain well-written
"information," that information becomes comprehensible only to readers who can
combine the new information with organized existing knowledge (a knowledge
network) on the subject matter. The comprehension of new information requires a
meeting of the new with the known. This meeting of the known with the new is one of
the fundamental concepts of cognitive learning theory.

Notice that the known does not wait passively in the mind; it actively goes forth to meet
and make sense of the new. Indeed, unless a reader is able to predict, to ask relevant
questions, and to know how to find the answers, comprehension is not possible. Note 14

Steps 4 and 5. Learning

Comprehension does not necessarily lead to learning--at least, not to learning of a

meaningful, useful kind. How many people can remember the actual words of books
they read five years ago? As Bartlett demonstrated in the 1930s, people do not
ordinarily remember much of the exact information they read. Instead, they learn the
"gist" of it. They select. They use selected portions of the information to address issues
important to them. (Never mind the national scores, did the local team win?) For all
practical purposes, the vast bulk of information one reads is simply forgotten. We use it
to "service" our model of the world, then discard the details.

Once new information has been comprehended--by linking it to what is already known--
cognitive theorists say that the new information can then be learned through activities
which enrich the connections between the new and the old knowledge. Researchers
have studied some ways students convert "comprehended information" into "learned
information," through such activities as taking notes, summarizing, outlining, making
analogies, relating the information to yourself personally, creating mental imagery, and
similar activities known as elaboration.

 Elaboration refers to any method of "thinking about new ideas and prior
knowledge together" so the two become more deeply connected. Note 15

 Learning takes place when the new information becomes a part of the existing
knowledge network.

 When elaborated and richly integrated, the new knowledge becomes

meaningful and useful.

 The new knowledge can fit into the existing knowledge network (the number
one team won again), or it can modify that network (the Dodgers moved to
L.A.)

Knowledge can be called "meaningful" only after it is richly interconnected with related
knowledge. Knowledge can be called "useful" only if you can access it under
appropriate circumstances. Meaningful knowledge is filed and cross referenced with
other knowledge to which it is connected. Useful knowledge is filed and cross-
referenced so that you can find it when you need it.

Some of these points may seem obvious, but studies strongly suggest that this kind of
mental housekeeping makes the difference between good and poor readers. Note 16

Steps 6 and 7. Recall and Reconstruction

People apparently do not store knowledge as long, complete strings of text but rather in
a dynamic, interlinked network in which the elements have been analyzed into
categories linked by multiple relationships that may be organized as schemas, scripts,
narratives, or other forms.

The organization of memory seems to be a good deal more like multidimensional

hypertext than like paragraphs of linear prose. People not only abstract the gist from
what they read, they often do not recall what they read verbatim; instead, they
reconstruct what they "know."

Just as a well-organized knowledge network enables you to scan for and read only what
you do not already know in a new text, the knowledge network enables you to
regenerate the essence of what you know, rather than having to remember it as complete
texts of information. Memory--again, the discovery dates to Bartlett in the 1930s--is
reconstructive. People reinvent as they recall, and they appear to reinvent on the basis of
some deep structure they have used to hang a few key facts on. A good knowledge
structure, in fact, can enable you to "remember" things you never learned--by inferring
them from what you already know.

The blurred boundary between inference and perception is one thing that makes eye-
witnesses unreliable, and a skillful questioner can induce a witness to "remember"
things never experienced. In spite this blurriness, we derive a good deal of our
knowledge of the world by applying reason to the things we already know, extending
those by inference, and making good guesses about what "must" exist in the gaps of our
knowledge. In Kenneth Boulding's more organic terms, "Knowledge grows also because
of inward teachers as well as outward messages." Notes 17 - 18

The basic theme we are developing can be stated this way:

 The world is not given: we interpret, construct, even imagine it.

 We use knowledge to recall some things verbatim, reconstruct the gist of other
things, and infer other things we never literally learned.

 In addition, we use knowledge to guide our perceptions, strategies, and

comprehension of new experiences and information.
  People seek information in order to create mental constructs, to confirm those
mental constructs, and to modify those constructs so that they fit more closely
with experience.

In a nutshell: Cognition is an active, recursive, integrated process by which we

continuously model the world and continuously modify the model.
[If you are on the Short Tour, click here for a Summary of cognitive reading theory.]

Feedback

(Not shown in the diagram.) Under ideal conditions, learners receive feedback at
various stages. A teacher, for example, may:

 focus learners' attention on important features of the new information, correct

their first impressions, help them recall relevant knowledge, and build
motivation.

 help learners elaborate the new knowledge so it becomes interconnected,

memorable, and useful.

 identify and correct misconceptions or introduce helpful concepts and

vocabulary.

 elicit strategies from students, or teach strategies helpful for different kinds of
reading (e.g., scanning, reading headings, analyzing an argument).

 evaluate students' assimilated knowledge to see how accurate and complete and
useable it is, then make assignments to correct deficiencies.

Because they are not interactive, the major media cannot provide direct feedback to
ensure the accuracy of what readers learn. Later, we will consider whether media can
offer alternatives to interactive feedback.

Forward
Contents

Gerald Grow's Home Page

Cognitive Learning Theories and E-learning

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Cognitive Learning Theories

Cognitive developmental research has also influenced the development of teaching and learning
English in the area of learning capacity. Cognitive developmental research has had an impact on
the constructivism movement in education and educational technology (Gilliani, 2003).
Constructivism originated in the ideas of Piaget (1952) to account for the way in which children
acquire cognitive abilities in an apparently regular order and children are engaged actively in
constructing theories about how the world around them works.

It should be noted that Piaget’s observations and theories were not really targeted at language
learning or development but at overall mental growth in general. One of his most famous
statements about cognition in general was that “Intelligence is an adaptation…To say that
intelligence is a particular instance of biological adaptation is thus to suppose that it is
essentially an organization and that its function is to structure the universe just as the organism
structures its immediate environment” (Piaget, 1963, pp. 3-4).To him, language was essentially
just a representation of mental processes going on in the child’s mind, though his later work
brought more focus to aspects of interaction and language ability (Lightbown, and Spada,
1999).

A key aspect of Piagetian psychology is the idea that cognitive development in young children
stems from action and interaction with the world around them. This begins with physical objects
in a problem-solving sequence that is gradually internalized and develops the child’s thinking
ability. In terms of how this related to language acquisition in children, Piaget basically saw
language as a representative system, one of a variety of ‘symbol systems’ developed throughout
childhood to represent new knowledge acquired as children engage in a physical way with
aspects of their environments (Lightbown & Spada, 1999, p. 23). In many ways, his theories
were seen as working from the idea that right-hemispheric brain activity preceded left
hemispheric brain activity, a notion which James Asher reiterates as one of the founding
principles of his world famous Total Physical Response (TPR) method (Richards & Rodgers,
2001).

In addition, Piaget is known in for his theories about “stages of cognitive development” and the
concepts of “assimilation” and “accommodation”. Piaget later went on from his early original
theories to make observations about the way arguments among children are fundamental in the
process of developing internalized reasoning skills, as cooperation in child play can be a major
factor in the development of moral judgment (Richard-Amato, 1996, p. 427) Some of his
theories had evolved to the point that they were considered to be from the same theoretical
viewpoint as Vygotsky’s in terms of the central role they allocated to social interaction in
language learning, and have even been considered fundamental in the growth of relatively
contemporary notions such as Cooperative Language Learning (Richards & Rodgers, 2001).

The contemporary notions relates to Piaget’s general theory about how physical activity and the
associated experience interacting with one’s environment which leads to mental growth:

Intelligence is assimilation to the extent that it incorporates all the given

data of experience within its framework…There can be no doubt either,
that mental life is also accommodation to the environment. Assimilation
can never be pure because by incorporating new elements into its earlier
schemata the intelligence constantly modifies the latter in order to adjust
them to new elements. (Piaget, 1963, p. 6-7).

In the context of language learning, the way new information is found and utilized is considered
to be a conceptual model (or ‘schema’). Activity can lead to mental development through two
means: ‘assimilation’ and ‘accommodation’. Assimilation basically involves an action whereby
the child does not actually “change” his or her knowledge, just reapplies the same action in
different circumstances. Accommodation, on the other hand, indicates that some kind of
alteration or adjustment of the knowledge occurs, as a result of interaction with new things
present in the environment (Richards & Rodgers, 2001).

Other theorist, Bruner (1966) proposed a learning theory whose educational implications
resemble the concrete to abstract concept of Piaget. Such a process is called scaffolding where
the learner is initially dealing with concrete subjects, and the mentor provides a great amount of
support. However, the support fades away as the learner begins to think abstractly. This shift
can lead to very rapid learning, but is also risky process because it means abandoning old ways
of viewing concept. This notion of scaffolding is useful, because it describes how new models
of concept can be introduced to learners gradually and in a way lessens the risk (Gillani, 2003).

Furthermore Flavell (1985) has provided a more detailed discussion of three operations as the
continuation of Piaget’s work in the area of cognitive development. The three operations are
called; combination reasoning, propositional reasoning, and hypothetical-deductive reasoning.
Combination reasoning refers to the ability to consider different factors to solve problem. This
reasoning provides the learner with the ability to look at problems from an integrated approach.
Propositional reasoning refers to the characteristic that learners acquire to reason on the basis of
assumption to solve problems. Hypothetical-deductive reasoning allows the learner to consider
different hypotheses in dealing with a problem. This also enables the learner to gather data and
test different hypotheses to come up with a possible solution (Flavell, 1985). In brief, cognitive
theories are useful theory to explain how, why, and when learners develop and learn new
concept.

Cognitive Theories and Learning

Cognitive theories are not entirely perfect in their application to language learning especially in
the classroom context. However, some of the key concepts are very solid and useful (Schwebel,
et al., 1973). Piaget’s concept has given significant contribution to learning. First, he believed
that the ability to take action to solve some kind of problem presented by the environment was
neither innate nor a process of imitation – the child takes the action from the outset and through
the experience acquires new mental knowledge. The second, first language development did not
play anywhere near as much a role in children’s mental growth as did the key concept of taking
action and learning from it (Riley, 1996). The third, he paid attention on children’s learning and
cognitive development by focusing on biological factors as determining his famous “universal
stages of development” theory (Richard-Amato, 1996) and then begun to focus a lot more on
social factors in explaining cognitive development in children (Schwebel, et al., 1973). Fourth,
Piaget essentially saw the concepts of “learning” and “mental development” as separate from
each other, that “learning utilizes development but does not shape its course” (Richard-Amato,
1996, p. 38).

Despite his many critics, Piaget’s views on mental development in children have important
implications for concepts in language learning. The idea that children try to make sense of the
environment they find themselves in and actively seek to manipulate ideas and concepts,
creating new knowledge for themselves as they go through this process and using these
experiences to negotiate new situations and problems. The second important idea is the
importance of a child’s environment in terms of affecting the number and type of opportunities
available to apply or adapt new knowledge systems. On the first score, it needs to be
acknowledged that what children have already experienced or know how to do with language is
likely to have an effect on how they tackle the next ‘language problem’ to come their way, and
that most children characteristically and instinctively want to find new solutions to new
problems. In terms of the environment, such as English classroom in the middle of an EFL
context affords very different opportunities to see the need for and try out new language than a
natural environment where everything around them operates in the target language they are
trying to learn (Gorman, 1972).

Cognitive Learning Theories and E-learning

Cognitive theories provide a frame of reference by which educators and educational

technologies can analyze the behavior of the learner and design educational environments where
the learners can construct their own knowledge. In the design of e-learning environment, such
as SimCity, science exploration (http://www.exploratorium.edu/IFI/index.html) and many
other similar programs which are mostly designed by using software called
Macromedia Authorware, are examples of the influence of cognitive approach. These
e-learning environments attempt to guide the learners to construct knowledge in the
process of learning. In other words, the learners should be given opportunity in doing
meaningful activities which facilitates the creation of personalized meaning. Good
interactive online instructions facilitate knowledge construction because the learners
have to take initiative to learn and to interact with other students and instructor (Murphy
& Cifuentes, 2001). Furthermore, learners experience the information first-hand, which
gives them the opportunity to contextualize and personalize the information
themselves. According to Heinich et al. (2002), learning is the development of new
knowledge, skills, and attitudes as the learner interacts with information and the
environment. Interaction is also critical to creating a sense of presence and a sense of
community for online learners, and to promoting transformational learning (Murphy &
Cifuentes, 2001). Learners receive the learning materials through the technology,
process the information, and then personalize and contextualize the information.
 Flow Chart 2.2

In the transformation process, learners interact with the content, with other learners, and with
the instructors to test and confirm ideas and to apply what they learn. Garrison et al. (2003)
claimed that it is the design of the educational experience that includes the transactional nature
of the relationship between instructor, learners, and content that is of significance to the learning
experience. In the e-learning environment, the learners have the freedom to explore the learning
materials and to experience the learning process as can be seen in flow chart 2.2. The learners
have the freedom to take the path of their own. For example, the learner can login to the site and
go directly to class forum to see what the teacher and peers have posted and discussed, then go
to learning materials or even directly to the quiz. The learner also has the freedom to logout the
program at anytime. In other words, constructivism underpins the understanding of how
individuals learn in a social context and extends to the learning organization, which by
nature its members learning together, improves its activities through group reflection
and sharing of experiences. In this case e-learning has the potential to overcome some
of the limitations of traditional learning, including the fixed times and locations for
learning. E-learning allows for a synergy between advances in information and
communication technologies (Holmes and John Gardner, 2006).

The web-based model for TEFL is adapting some of the cognitive theories. Various
authentic learning materials are presented and the students have the freedom to
explore the materials. Using the knowledge gained from the materials, students are
given the opportunity to discuss and share their knowledge with other students. The
discussion and sharing can be done online and offline.

To illustrate the influenced of cognitive learning theory, ‘Astro-Venture’ an educational

multimedia web environment is a good example (http://astroventure.arc.nasa.gov). This
website is intended for children and was developed by NASA Technology Team. In
‘Astro-Venture’, learners are first presented with the challenge of how to design a
planet star system that would be able to meet their biological survival needs. Learners
put forward with the aspects of Earth and solar system that allow human inhabitation.
The learners are informed that they will be working with NASA scientists who will help
them in their research to understand how the Earth meets human biological needs.
Learners conduct this research by engaging in multimedia training modules allowing
them changing astronomical, atmospheric, and geological aspects of the Earth and
solar system and see the effects of the changes on Earth. From these observations,
learners draw conclusions about what aspects allowed Earth to remain habitable.
Learners can interact with the NASA scientists by mean of forum discussion provided
in the website. This site also provides special pages for teachers and parents allowing
them to download texts about the facts of the Earth and Solar system so they can help
their learners in explaining the astronomical, biological, geological and atmospheric
facts.

When learners have a complete understanding of how the astronomical, biological,

geological and atmospheric condition of Earth, they are ready to design a habitable
planet. Learners then engage in a multimedia activity in the website to design a
habitable planet. The learners are required to hypothesize various combinations of
conditions, and test their hypothesis to see if it results in a habitable planet.

In other words, cognitivists see learning as an internal process that involves memory,
thinking, reflection, abstraction, motivation, and metacognition. Cognitive psychology
looks at learning from an information processing point of view, where the learner uses
different types of memory during learning. Sensations are received through the senses
into the sensory store before processing occurs. The information persists in the
sensory store for less than one second (Kalat, 2007), and if it is not transferred to
working memory immediately, it is lost. Cognitive psychology postulates that
information is stored in long-term memory in the form of nodes which connect to form
relationships; that is, in networks. In addition, information maps that show the major
concepts in a topic, and the relationships between those concepts, should be included
in the online learning materials. According to Stoyanova and Kommers (2002),
information-map generation requires critical reflection and is a method for externalizing
the cognitive structure of learners. To facilitate deeper processing, learners should be
encouraged to generate their own information maps. The implication of cognitive theory
for online learning:

Strategies used should allow learners to perceive and attend to the

information so that it can be transferred to working memory Ally (2005)
suggests some strategies to promote perception and attention for online
learning; (1) Important information should be placed in the centre of the
screen for reading, and learners must be able to read from left to right. (2)
Information critical for learning should be highlighted to focus learners’
attention. (3) Learners should be told why they should take the lesson, so
that they can attend to the information throughout the lesson. (4) The
difficulty level of the material must match the cognitive level of the learner, so
that the learner can both attend to and relate to the material. Links to both
simpler and more complicated materials can be used to accommodate
learners at different knowledge levels.
Strategies used should allow learners to retrieve existing information from
long-term memory to help make sense of the new information. Ally (2005)
suggests some strategies to facilitate the use of existing schema; (1) Use
advance organizers to activate existing cognitive structure or to provide the
information to incorporate the details of the lesson. (2) Provide conceptual
models that learners can use to retrieve existing mental models or to store
the structure they will need to use to learn the details of the lesson. (3) Use
pre-instructional questions to set expectations and to activate the learners’
existing knowledge structure. (4) Use prerequisite test questions to activate
the prerequisite knowledge structure required for learning the new materials.
With the flexibility of online learning, students with diverse background and
knowledge can choose the most appropriate path to review previous or
prerequisite learning before new information is presented.
A variety of learning strategies should be included in online instruction to
accommodate individual differences and learning styles (Cassidy, 2004).
Learning style refers to how a learner perceives, interacts with, and
responds to the learning environment; it measures individual differences.
Information should be presented in different modes to facilitate processing
and transferring it to long-term memory. Textual, verbal, and visual
information should be presented to encourage encoding. According to dual-
coding theory (Paivio, 1986), information received in different modes
(textual and visual) will be processed better than that presented in a single
mode (text). Dual-coded information is processed in different parts of the
brain, resulting in more encoding.
Encourage learners to use their metacognitive skills to help in the learning
process (Yorke & Knight, 2004). Metacognition is a learner’s ability to be
aware of his or her cognitive capabilities and use these capabilities to learn.
When learning online, learners should be given the opportunity to reflect on
what they are learning, collaborate with other learners, and check their
progress. Self-check questions and exercises with feedback throughout a
lesson are good strategies to allow learners to check how they are doing,
so they can use their metacognitive skills to adjust their learning approach
if necessary.