Constructivist Instruction

Success or Failure?

Sigmund Tobias, Thomas M. Duffy, Sigmund Tobias, Thomas M. Duffy

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9781135847920
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Pedagogía
• Subtopic: Educación general

Constructivist Instruction: Success or Failure? brings together leading thinkers from both sides of the hotly debated controversy about constructivist approaches to instruction. Although constructivist theories and practice now dominate the fields of the learning sciences, instructional technology, curriculum and teaching, and educational psychology, they have also been the subject of sharp criticism regarding sparse research support and adverse research findings. This volume presents:

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• the evidence for and against constructivism;

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• the challenges from information-processing theorists; and

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• commentaries from leading researchers in areas such as text comprehension, technology, as well as math and science education, who discuss the constructivist framework from their perspectives.

Chapters present detailed views from both sides of the controversy. A distinctive feature of the book is the dialogue built into it between the different positions. Each chapter concludes with discussions in which two authors with opposing views raise questions about the chapter, followed by the author(s)' responses to those questions; for some chapters there are several cycles of questions and answers. These discussions, and concluding chapters by the editors, clarify, and occasionally narrow the differences between positions and identify needed research.

Part I
Introduction

1
The Success or Failure of Constructivist Instruction

An Introduction

Sigmund Tobias Institute for Urban and Minority Education, Teachers College, Columbia University

Thomas M. Duffy School of Education, Indiana University

The design of effective learning environments is taking on increasing importance with the growing dissatisfaction with our education systems at both the pre-K–12 and the post-secondary levels. There have been wide fluctuations in strategies at both levels, but over the past two decades arguably the dominant approaches to the design of instruction have been driven by the conceptual frameworks and theories called “constructivism.” The purpose of this book is to discuss the present status of constructivism, applied to teaching and the development of instructional materials.

Of course constructivism is not a new view. Von Glasersfeld (1989) attributes the first constructivist theory to an Italian philosopher, Giambattista Vico, in the early 18th century. As described by von Glasersfeld, “one of Vico’s basic ideas was that epistemic agents can know nothing but the cognitive structures they themselves have put together … ‘to know’ means to know how to make” (1989, p. 123). The foundation for the current resurgence in interest, as reflected in the chapters in this volume, can be traced to the work of Vygotsky (1978), Dewey (1929), Piaget (1952), and Bruner (1966). But the more immediate stimulus for the growth of constructivist theory and its application to instruction can arguably be linked to three more recent articles. Brown, Collins, and Duguid (1989) argued that knowledge is situated in the activity of the learner and is a product of that activity and the context and culture in which it occurs. This situativity view is one of the defining characteristics of the constructivist framework. It contrasts to the then prevailing information-processing view of learning as processing information composed of concepts, procedures, and facts. While context was of little importance in the traditional view (Chanquoy, Tricot, & Sweller, 2007), the constructivist saw the context, including the goals of the learner, as integral to the understanding that developed.

Resnick (1987), in her AERA presidential address, examined the situativity view from the perspective of informal learning out of school. Specifically, she contrasted learning in everyday activities to the design of learning in school and explored how those two contexts or situations affected what is learned. She noted four contrasts with learning out of school typically involving: socially shared activities rather than individual learning; direct engagement rather than decontextualized symbolic thinking; the use of cognitive tools (e.g., the roofer using a pitch calculator) rather than unaided thought; and, learning situation-specific skills rather than general skills.

Lave and Wenger (1991) extended the situativity framework to a more ethnographic analysis of learning in communities. Their study of communities of practice demonstrated the role of situated learning through apprenticeship and, most importantly, the development of identity as one participates in a community of practice.

Duffy and Jonassen (1992) speculated that the interest in constructivism arising from this work stemmed in large part from the impact of the information age on instructional requirements. “Traditional models of learning and instruction emphasized forms of mastering the information in a content domain…. However, it is simply no longer possible (there is too much) or even reasonable (it changes too rapidly) to master most content domains” (1992, p. ix). Thus, from this perspective, the interest was not so much in learning’s theoretical base but in the need for a new approach to meet new learning demands.

Duffy and Jonassen (1992) sought to identify the implications of the constructivist views of learning for the design of instruction by engaging constructivist and traditional instructional designers in a conversation about instructional design. The goal was to find common threads to form the basis for an instructional theory based on constructivism and the development of principles for the design of instruction.

In the 17 years since the Duffy and Jonassen (1992) book was published, there has been little progress in developing the instructional theory or identifying those design principles tied to constructivism. The lack of an emerging instructional theory parallels the lack of refinement of constructivist theory. Indeed, to us it would appear that constructivism remains more of a philosophical framework than a theory that either allows us to precisely describe instruction or prescribe design strategies.

Of course, there are numerous instructional models proposed based on the constructivist framework. But there are seldom efforts to look across models to define common principles or to refine the model and its theoretical underpinnings in ways that can be tested. A notable effort to identify design principles has been supported by the National Science Foundation and spearheaded by the Israeli Institute of Technology (Kali, in press; http://design-principles.org). This database defines design features primarily for the use of technology. The features are linked to principles that, in turn, are hierarchically linked. Thus the database provides potential. However, it does not provide or attempt to induce a theoretical framework in which the consistency of principles and features can be assessed. Nor does it seem to have generated the research base that would help provide stronger instructional guidance on the use and limitations of the principles and features.

The lack of a well-specified instructional theory or articulation of learning principles may also be seen in the discussions of scaffolding, i.e., providing guidance in instruction. It was introduced by Wood, Bruner, and Ross (1976) and referred to creating a “highly constrained situation” (Pea, 2004). This is interesting since Bruner also introduced discovery learning, which has been interpreted as providing minimal guidance in learning (Kirschner, Sweller, & Clark, 2006). Scaffolding differs from the broader use of guidance in two ways (see Pea, 2004). First, guidance is provided only when learners are unable to proceed. That is, it scaffolds or helps learners move beyond what they can do without assistance. Second, guidance is gradually withdrawn or faded as the learner develops competence. Perhaps the idea of providing guidance only as needed may be the basis for the misinterpretation that constructivists do not provide guidance.

While scaffolding is central to the design of constructivist learning environments, constructivists have been slow to formulate testable principles—or even specific guidance—for the use of scaffolding. In discussing the papers in a special issue on scaffolding in The Journal of the Learning Sciences, Pea (2004) noted that:

A theory of scaffolding should successfully predict for any given learner and any given task what forms of support provided by what agent(s) and designed artifacts would suffice for enabling that learner to perform at a desirable level of proficiency on that task, which is known to be unachievable without such scaffolding.

(2004, p. 443)

[T]he instructional designer does not have at hand any rules for making decisions about what kinds of scaffolds … to provide in what kind of adaptively relevant sequencing for advancing a learner’s capabilities.

(2004, p. 445)

In view of this lack of specificity, and with the popularity of constructivism in education, it is not surprising that the instructional models derived from the constructivist framework have been challenged. Most recently, Kirschner et al. (2006) argued that constructivist-based instructional approaches could not be effective given our knowledge of human cognitive architecture. Their contention about cognitive architecture is based on the widely accepted information-processing model that defines a limited-capacity working memory as the gateway to storage in long-term memory. From this information-processing perspective, they maintain that learners, especially novices, are unable to effectively process information due to the limits of working memory, hence learning suffers. According to Kirschner et al., minimally guided instruction overtaxes working memory. They review research which, they argue, demonstrates the failure of constructivist paradigms they considered to be paradigms where there is minimal guidance for the learner.

The publication of the Kirschner et al. (2006) article was followed by a set of papers defending the constructivist position (Schmidt, Loyens, van Gog, & Paas, 2007; Hmelo-Silver, Duncan, & Chinn, 2007; Kuhn, 2007) and a rejoinder to those by Sweller, Kirschner, and Clark (2007). The original article also stimulated a debate, organized and chaired by the first author of this chapter, held at the 2007 conference of the American Educational Research Association (Debate, 2007) regarding the paper’s main assertion that all constructivist approaches failed. However, they viewed instruction based on constructivism as offering minimal guidance for learning, a view hotly contest in the chapters in this book. All the participants in the debate (Kirschner, Rosenshine, Jonassen, and Spiro) have written chapters for this volume in addition to many other scholars.

This book was stimulated by the debate, and asks both supporters and opponents of constructivist instruction to present their views in the kind of detail possible in a book chapter where evidence supporting or refuting constructivist claims may be presented and discussed. Therefore we have sought to promote a discussion between the researchers to try to clarify the different perspectives and seek common ground—or at least an agreement on strategies for evaluating the implications of the constructivist perspective for teaching. In the first section of the book we have asked constructivists to provide their instructional theory and its links to constructivism, as well as to describe the research that supports that approach to instruction. In the second section we asked those who question the constructivist-based instructional theory to critique it and present their alternative view along with the research evidence to support it. Finally, we asked both constructivists and those holding alternative views to examine the research in specific domains with the goal of evaluating support for constructivism. These domains are reading comprehension, mathematics, science, and use of technology.

One major problem in chapters written by supporters and opponents of a position is that they too often talk past one another. In the case of instruction informed by constructivism there are different assumptions about what constitutes evidence, what is meant by “guidance,” the learning outcomes sought, etc. We have tried to promote discussion that will help to resolve, or at least clarify these issues and perhaps establish common ground by promoting discussion between authors. We have asked those generally considered constructivist to ask questions of the authors of at least two chapters representing the opposing view and then offered them a chance to react to the responses they received. Similarly, we asked those who question the constructivist view to ask questions of at least two authors of “constructivist” chapters and react to the responses. This dialog is inserted following the chapter of the author(s) being questioned.

Relationships of Chapters

In the section of the book devoted to chapters by constructivists, Jonassen (Chapter 2) provides a general overview of the constructivist position and takes issue with Kirschner et al.’s (2006) definition of learning as a change in long-term memory and describes several other ways of examining cognitive architecture. He maintains that what is really important is the kind of learning that is stored in long-term memory. Jonassen then proposes a number of different kinds of learning. He also suggest...

Table of contents

• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Part I Introduction
• Part II The Evidence for Constructivism
• Part III Challenges to the Constructivist View
• Part IV An Examination of Specific Learning and Motivational Issues
• Part V Summing Up
• Index