OVERVIEW

 Lev Vygotsky's constructivist theory, which is often called

Social Constructivism.

 Acording to Lev Vygotsky Culture 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.
 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.
 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.

 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

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.
 Social Constructivism: 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.
 Social Constructivism: 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
 Social Constructivism:
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).
 Social Constructivism: 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.