Social Cognitive and Constructivist Views of Learning

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Social Cognitive and Constructivist Views of
Learning
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Parents, Peers, and Teachers as Social Influences
on Students

• Consider the following questions
• Jerome Bruner once said that learning in most
  settings is a communal activity. Do you agree or
  disagree?
• How can peers be a negative influence on
  learning?
• What role does parents involvement play in
  students choosing of social groups?
• Parents who are authoritative
• Parents who are uninvolved
• Parents who are indulgent
• What does research tell us about cultural/ethnic
  differences with respect to who kids identify as
  those peers they most admire?
• What influence can teachers have on students
  learning?
• What is enactive learning?
• What is vicarious learning?
• According to some research, For a large number
  of adolescents, peers not parents are the
  chief determinants of how intensely they are
  invested in school and how much effort they
  devote to education. What do you think about
  this quotation?

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Learning by Observing Others

• What is observational learning?
• What are the elements of observational learning?
• Attention (the facilitator/presenter must help
  students attend to critical information by giving
  clear presentations and highlighting important
  information)
• Retention
• Production
• Motivation (if learners anticipate being
  reinforced for imitating the actions of the
  model, they may be more motivated)
• Reinforcement (direct reinforcement, vicarious
  reinforcement, self-reinforcement)
• Several factors influence observational learning
• Developmental level (as children grow older, they
  can focus for longer and self motivate)
• Status of the model (if students perceive that
  the person modeling the activity whether it is
  the teacher or an outside source like a guest
  speaker or a person presenting information on
  video is competent, prestigious, enthusiastic,
  etc., they are more likely to observe the model
  (hence, the reason that advertising agencies
  often use entertainers for advertisements)
• Vicarious consequences
• Outcome expectations (for observational learning
  to take place, learners need to value the
  outcome)
• Self-efficacy (students need to believe that they
  are capable of doing the activity of solving
  the problem, etc.)

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Observational Learning in Teaching

• Five outcomes of observational learning
• Directing Attention
• Fine-tuning already-learned behaviors by
  observing others, students might better
  understand which of their already learned
  behaviors to use
• Strengthening or weakening inhibitions
  (ripple-effect) Teachers can reward or punish
  behaviors, and especially if the person being
  punished or rewarded is a class leader, the
  behavior may be strengthened or weakened in the
  others (i.e., the ripple effect is the
  contagious spreading of behaviors through
  imitation
• Teaching new behaviors (modeling) Teachers can
  model, but models who are the same age as the
  students may be particularly effective, as may
  well-known models (athletes, entertainers, etc.
• Arousing emotion even if the person hasnt
  experienced the thing, seeing the model (or
  learning vicariously) may arouse emotions such as
  fear

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Reciprocal Determinism

• In social cognitive theory, internal and external
  factors are important (and can all affect each
  other)
• Personal factors beliefs, expectations,
  attitudes, knowledge
• Physical and social environment resources,
  consequences of actions, choices, other people,
  physical settings
• Behavior individual actions, choices, verbal
  statements
• The interactions of these forces is referred to
  as reciprocal determination

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Social Cognitive and Constructivist Views of
Learning

• Constructivism and Situated Learning

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Constructivist Views of Learning

• Constructivism includes the learners contribution
  to meaning and learning (building understanding
  and making sense of information) through
• Individual activity
• Social activity

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Psychological/Individual Constructivism

• Some constructivists are interested in how
  INDIVIDUALS build knowledge
• Piagets psychological constructivist
  perspective, for example, focuses not on
  correct representations but rather on meaning
  as constructed by the individual
• Constructivist theories emphasize individual
  meaning making but not to ensure students find
  the right answer - as does most of information
  processing - but rather on the process (product
  vs. process).

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Vygotskys Social Constructivism

• Vygotsky believed that individual development is
  shaped by
• Social interaction
• Cultural tools
• Activity
• Learners appropriate the outcomes that are
  produced when they work together
• Learners acquire new strategies and knowledge of
  the world and culture when they work together

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How is Knowledge Constructed?

• The realities and truths of the external world
  direct knowledge construction (information
  processing)
• Internal processes such as Piagets organization,
  assimilation, and accommodation direct knowledge
  construction (Piaget)
• Both external (cognitive) and internal
  (environment and social) factors direct knowledge
  construction (Vygotsky Bandura)

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Common Elements of Constructivism

• Embed learning in complex, realistic, and
  relevant learning environments
• Provide for social negotiation and shared
  responsibility as a part of learning
• Support multiple perspectives and use multiple
  representations of content
• Nurture self-awareness and an understanding that
  knowledge is constructed
• Encourage ownership in learning