Bruner’s Constructivist Theory

A) Description

Bruner's constructivist theory is based upon the study of cognition. A major theme in this theory is that "learning is an active process in which learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge" (Kearsely 1994b). Cognitive structures are used to provide meaning and organization to experiences and allows the individual to go beyond the information given.


According to Bruner, the instructor should try and encourage students to construct hypotheses, makes decisions, and discover principles by themselves (Kearsley 1994b). The instructor's task is to "translate information to be learned into a format appropriate to the learner's current state of understanding" and organize it in a spiral manner "so that the student continually builds upon what they have already learned."



Bruner (1966, as cited in Kearsley 1994b) states that a theory of instruction should address the following aspects:

1. the most effective sequences in which to present material
2. the ways in which a body of knowledge can be structured so that it can be most readily grasped by the learner

B) Practical Application
Bruner’s constructivist theory can be applied to instruction, as Kearsley (1994b) surmises, by applying the following principles:

1. Instruction must be concerned with the experiences and contexts that make the student willing and able to learn (readiness).
2. Instruction must be structured so that it can be easily grasped by the student (spiral organization).
3. Instruction should be designed to facilitate extrapolation and or fill in the gaps (going beyond the information given).

EXAMPLE
The following example is taken from Bruner (1973, as cited in Kearsley 1994b):

The concept of prime numbers appears to be more readily grasped when the child, through construction, discovers that certain handfuls of beans cannot be laid out in completed rows and columns. Such quantities have either to be laid out in a single file or in an incomplete row-column design in which there is always one extra or one too few to fill the pattern. These patterns, the child learns, happen to be called prime. It is easy for the child to go from this step to the recognition that a multiple table, so called, is a record sheet of quantities in completed multiple rows and columns. Here is factoring, multiplication and primes in a construction that can be visualized.

• Instructional Objective: Recognize and define a prime number.
• Methodology:

1. Ask the student to get a handful of pennies, beans, or any other countable object.
2. Show the students 6 pennies. Show that six pennies can be organized into two groups of three, three groups of two, or one group of six.
3. Ask the student to count out 8 pennies and organize the pennies into as many EQUAL groups as they can.
4. Show answer.
5. Ask the student to count out 18 pennies and organize the pennies into as many EQUAL groups as they can.
6. Show answer.
7. Ask the student to count out 7 pennies and organize the pennies into as many EQUAL groups as they can.
8. Show answer.
9. Ask the student to count out 13 pennies and organize the pennies into as many EQUAL groups as they can.
10. Show answer.
11. State that 7 and 13 are prime numbers, while 6, 8, and 18 are not. Ask the following questions: What is a prime number? What is the rule or principle for determining whether a number is prime or not?
12. Explain the principle that when a certain number of pennies can only be grouped into one equal row or column, then that number is called a prime number.
13. Show a selection of numbers or examples of different groups of coins. Ask the student to identify which ones are prime.
14. Show answer.

C) Related Theories, Pedagogical Practices and Practical Web-Design Strategies

1. Attract, hold and focus attention so students can learn principles. Fahy (1999, 59) lists the following ways to attract attention:

• To draw attention, use novelty, differences, motion, changes in intensity or brightness, the presence of moderate complexity, and lean and focussed displays. NOTE: Merill cautions against the overuse of attention-getting strategies, especially on the computer. "Screen motion and animated movement are very powerful in attracting and holding attention. The program should therefore not require the user to read while watching an animated display" (1989, as cited in Fahy 1999, 60).
• To increase attention and maintain learner focus, create moderate uncertainty about what is about to happen next or what the eventual outcome of a presentation will be.
• To sustain attention, maintain change and variety in the learning environment.
• To focus attention, teach learners to interpret certain cues such as specific colors, sounds, symbols, fonts, screen or display arrangement, underlining, etc.
• To focus attention, use captions in pictures, graphics and illustrations.

• Improve retention by sequencing screens and presenting related materials together. In designing materials of all kinds sequence is important. "Material presented together will be associated in the learner’s memory" (Fahy 1999, 79) and more easily recalled especially if repetition is used. Fahy believes that "events ideas, words, concepts and stimuli in general which are not organized in some meaningful way are harder to understand and remember than those which are embedded in some organizational context" (p. 60). Fahy also advises that when sequencing consider that the first and last displays in any sequences are especially important. "Introductions and summaries are key learning opportunities" (p. 61).

Provide structural cues to avoid information vertigo. Jones and Farquhar (1997, 241) recommend arranging information "in a non-threatening manner through techniques such as chunking, overviews, advance organizers, maps, and a fixed-display format." They also advise that "the consistent placement and style of section titles is [an] important cue to the structure of information."