Educational Psychology 302

1
Educational Psychology302

• Session 7
• Knowledge Construction and Higher Level Thinking

2
Organizing Knowledge Concepts . . .

• Conceptualizingmentally grouping or categorizing
  objects or events.
• Indentifying Defining Featuresall positive
  instances of the objects correlational feature.
• Prototypingconstructing an image of a typical
  example for comparative purposes.
• ExamplarsMany illustrations of the concept.

3
Organizing Knowledge Schemas and Scripts . . .

• Schemas Organized bodies of knowledge about
  specific topics.
• Scripts Predictable sequence of events related
  to a particular activity.

4
Organizing Knowledge Personal Theory . . .

• General belief system about how the world
  operates. Theories are composed of the concepts
  and relationships among components of the belief
  system.

5
Promoting Effective Knowledge Construction

• Experimentationhands-on manipulation
• Exposure to ideas of othershistorical and
  contemporary
• Conceptual understandingintegrated,
  interrelated, meaningful learning
• Dialogueverbalize, share, discuss, debate
• Authentic activitiesreal world application

6
Confronting Resistance to Conceptual Change

• Identify misconceptions before the instruction
  begins
• Present ideas that support new ways of
  considering a concept
• Provide sufficient motivation for modifying
  current conceptions
• Recognize that in some instances, no evidence or
  instruction may be sufficient to change strongly
  held beliefs

7
Multi-cultural Education and Constructivism

• Assimilationtransform students and beliefs into
  a mainstream culture
• Cultural Pluralism
• Recognize diverse ethnic identities
• Adopt a multi-culture view
• Create equal opportunities

8
Approaches to Multi-Cultural Education

• Contributions ApproachEmphasize cultural
  differences on days set aside.
• Additive ApproachDiversity in cultural
  perspective are added to the curriculum.
• Transformative ApproachOverall framework of the
  the curriculum is changes to consider issues,
  themes from a variety of approaches.

9
Higher Level ThinkingTransfer . . .

• Definition Applying skills or knowledge from a
  previous experience in a new situation.
• PositiveNegative
• SpecificGeneral
• Affecting factors . . Instructional time,
  meaningful learning, practice time, similarity of
  tasks

10
Higher Level Thinking Problem-Solving. . .

• Well-definedIll-defined
• AlgorithmHeuristic
• Teach within the context of specific areas
• Scaffold difficult problems
• Induce small-group work to encourage the exchange
  of ideas and open discussion of issues
• Problem of mental-set

11
Higher Level Thinking Critical Thinking. . .

• Definition Evaluating information or arguments
  in terms of their accuracy or worth.
• Verbal reasoning
• Argument analysis
• Hypothesis testing
• Decision-making

12
Higher Level Thinking Metacognition. . .

• Definition Knowledge and beliefs regarding
  ones own cognitive processes and the attempt to
  regulate these processes to maximize learning and
  memory.
• Successful Strategies Teach how to study
  content (note taking, elaboration, summarizing,
  organizing, identifying important information).