Dr. S. K. Agrawal works as an Associate Professor at the Dept. of English, JRNRV University, Udaipur – India.
The term ‘constructivism’ refers both to the method of learning and nature of knowledge. It means the idea that individuals, through their interaction with the environment, construct their own knowledge. (Fosnot 1996; Steffe and Gale, 1995). The emphasis of the constructivist theory is both on the process and the product. In constructivist approach it is important to know how much students have learnt as well as the process by which they have learnt. Such a theory of knowledge and learning has significant implication for English Language Teaching (ELT). It changes the dynamics of the traditional classroom by empowering the learner as the architect of the learning process while redefining the role of the instructor as a guide and helper, rather than the source and conduit of knowledge.
There are three domains of teacher knowledge that contribute to the effectiveness of constructivist approaches to ELT. These include General pedagogic knowledge, Subject matter knowledge and Pedagogical content knowledge. Constructivist pedagogy is the link between theory and practice. Many theorists and practitioners, such as Brooks and Brooks (1993), Driscol(1994), Jonassen(1991) have generated constructivist pedagogy with an array of results. While these pedagogies share a set of core design principles, the peripheral principals tend to vary greatly. The following principles (Brooks and Brooks, 1993; Steffe and Gale, 1995) make the constructivist pedagogy effective:
(i) Learning should take place in real world environment: Object-oriented experience is a catalyst of knowledge construction. Experience provides the activity upon which the mind operates. In addition, knowledge construction is enhanced when the experience is authentic. An English language teacher can well exploit the real world environment by developing the tasks and exercises based on the experience and surroundings of his learners.
(ii) Learning should involve social negotiation: Social interaction provides for the development of socially relevant skills and knowledge. For example, a learner can attain the art of greeting more properly through social contact. An individual gains experience and understanding of a social situation through language, and the knowledge, thus, acquired is certainly much valid than the one acquired simply by reading books.
(iii) Knowledge should be relevant to the learner: Constructivism implies that knowledge serves an adaptive function. The knowledge, i.e. content and skills must be relevant to the individual’s need, understanding and goals. The relevance of the content is likely to increase the individual’s motivation.
(iv) Content and Skills should be understood within the framework of the learner’s background knowledge: It is beyond doubt that all learning begins with an individual’s prior knowledge, regardless of constructivist affiliation. Understanding a student’s behavior requires an understanding of the student’s mental structure. For example, when a student replies that the sentence ‘He is one of the students who are always regular’ is not correct, the teacher must not think it immediately to be wrong, but rather try to understand the student’s understanding of the concept of concord. Understanding the student’s rule usage makes it easier for the teacher to demonstrate the non-viability of the student’s understanding. The teacher in this case, for example, may ask the students, who are regular, to form a circle. Now he can illustrate that all of them are regular and he certainly is a part of the whole group (thus, who representing all the regular students and therefore the use of plural form of verb ‘are’.) Thus, the teacher will be able to create effective experiences, resulting in maximal learning.
(v) Formative assessment is necessary: A teacher should always take into account an individual’s current level of understanding in the ongoing teaching learning process. This he can do by continuously assessing the individual’s knowledge. This formative assessment is necessary to create the subsequent series of experiences and activities for the students.
(vi) Students should be encouraged to become self-aware: The underlying principle of constructivism is that learners are active in their construction of knowledge and meaning. This activity involves mental manipulation and self-organization of experiences, and requires that students mediate new meanings from existing knowledge, and form an awareness of current knowledge structures.
(vii) Teachers serve primarily as facilitators: The role of a teacher, in constructivist perspective, is that of a facilitator. He facilitates, provides examples, supports and challenges. He is not to transmit knowledge. In the classroom, the teacher creates experiences in which the learners participate, and which in turn leads to processing and acquisition of knowledge. The task of a teacher, according to the constructivist perspective, is to create awareness about their experiences, as there is no factual knowledge to transmit.
The Constructivist ELT Classroom
A classroom is a rich array of different backgrounds and ways of thinking. Myths, taboos and things one acquires from one’s family, friends, teachers, etc. form par of one’s cultural influence. Content is embedded in culture and it is difficult to separate the two. It is, therefore, necessary for a teacher to provide a neutral zone where the student can contribute to the ongoing activity through his creativity. In the constructivist classroom, the focus tends to shift from the teacher to the students. The classroom is not a place where the teacher pours knowledge into passive students. Students are actively involved in the learning process. The constructivist teacher sets up tasks and monitors students’ progress, guides the direction of students’ inquiry and promotes new pattern of thinking. In a constructivist ELT classroom students’ autonomy and initiative are encouraged; in it students are engaged in language tasks and the class uses raw data, primary sources, physical and interactive materials.
The Constructivist Teacher
Constructivism emphasizes that the learner is a sense maker, whereas the teacher is a cognitive guide. The constructivist view of learning means encouraging the students to use active techniques, to create more knowledge and then to reflect on and talk about what they are doing and how their understanding is changing. The teacher tries to understand the learners’ preexisting language conceptions and guides the task to address them and then build on them. Questioning is an integral part of constructivist learning. By questioning themselves the students become expert learners. When the learners reflect on their experiences, they develop increasingly strong abilities to integrate new information. The main task of the teacher here is to encourage this learning and reflection process. For example, the groups of students in a class are discussing a problem related to English grammar. Though the teacher knows the answer to the problem, he focuses on helping students restate their problems in useful ways. He prompts each student to reflect on and examine his or her current knowledge. When one of the students comes up with the relevant answer, the teacher seizes upon it and asks the other students to follow the same steps. They further design and perform more language tasks.
Constructivism accords due significance to the active role of the teacher. It modifies the traditional role of a teacher so that he may help students to construct knowledge rather than to reproduce a series of facts. It also transforms the students from a passive recipient of information to an active participant in the learning process. As a result, the students construct their knowledge actively rather than just mechanically receiving knowledge from the teacher or the textbook.
Instructional Strategies
Constructivist pedagogy envisages learner as an active sense maker and suggests new methods of instruction. It facilitates presentations of materials in a constructivist way and engage students in an explorative learning. It allows the learners to have more control over their own learning to think analytically and critically, and to work collaboratively. A teacher can create constructive learning environment in the classroom by adhering to the following strategies:
- Present new materials in small steps.
- Help students develop an organization for the skills/sub skills not known to them.
- Provide for intensive and extensive student practice.
- Anticipate and discuss potential difficulties.
- Regulate the difficulty of the material.
- Provide feedback and corrections.
- Increase student responsibilities.
- Provide independent practice with examples.
Evaluation
The evaluation in constructive must examine the thinking process. This is, however, not to suggest that the issue of thinking is independent of the content domain. (Bender et al, 1995). The possible ways of evaluation would be asking students to think aloud, address a problem in the field of content and then defend their decision, or reflect on their own learning and record the process through which they have constructed their view of the content. In brief, the evaluation must aim at examining the student’s ability to solve the communication problem with viable solution.
It is, thus, clear that constructivist pedagogy of learning signals a departure from theories, which view the world as objective truth to be explained and accepted. It accords new status to the learner as an active constructor within the learning activity instead of being the passive participant in the externally determined world of education. It defines teaching to be an exciting process of joining in the intellectual discovery of others. The constructivist becomes a fellow learner with the students he serves. It is observed that most of us try to transmit a vast amount of information within a limited time, using textbooks and multimedia. This is how the human brain is not properly utilized. The use of computers can substantially reduce the burden of human brain by storing vast amount of information. Human mind, thus, can advantageously be used to perform those tasks that cannot be done by a machine, such as decision-making, creative thinking, problem solving, etc. In brief, the constructivist pedagogy heralds a paradigm shift and the abandonment of traditional practices and principles;it also emphasizes that the notion of pedagogic space needs to be rethought by making it truly a productive activity.
References
Bedar, A. K., Cunningham, D. Duffy, T.M., and Perry, J.P. 1995 Theory into Practice: How Do We Link? In T. M. Duffy and D. H. Jonassen (eds.) Constructivism and Technology of Instruction- A Conversation. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ.
Brooks, J. G. and Brooks, M. G. 1993. In Search of Understanding: The Case for Constructivist Classroom. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, Alexandria, V. A.
Driscol, M. 1994. Psychology of Learning for Instruction. Allyn and Bacon, Boston.
Fosnot, C. T. 1996. Constructivism, Theory, Perspective and Practice. Teachers College press, New York.
Jonassen, D. H. 1991. Objectivism versus Constructivism, Do We Need a New Philosophical Paradigm? Educational Technology Research and Development 39(3).pp.11
Larochella, N. Bednarz and Garrison, J. 1998. Constructivism and Education (Eds) Cambridge Press, Cambridge.
Sharma, S. 2001. Constructivism, Paradigm Shift. In Perspectives in Education, 17(2).
Spivey, N.N. 1997 The Constructivist Metaphor, Academic Press, Boston.
Steffe, L. P. and Gale, J.1995. Constructivism in Education (Eds.), Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ.
A well-written article as it exploits the “Constructivist Pedagogy” with all the paraphernalia of strategies that can be employed in ELT classroom.