Learning is a lifelong process, it is
an active process and it goes from womb to tomb. Every day in our life we learn
something or the other. Experiences and mistakes make us learn better. In our
previous blog we have learnt about the various theories in the learning
process. Today we will encounter a very important aspect of learning process. I
personally have followed it and have got beautiful results with my daughter. We
can teach anything and everything to a child; it just depends upon the mode we
choose for the process. This Constructivist theory by Bruner is a very
important aspect which every teacher and parent must understand and know about
for the betterment of their students and children.
Jerome Bruner and Education
Cognitive psychologist Jerome Bruner
designed a concept attainment model to lead students learn concepts effectively
by organising information. He felt the goal of education should be intellectual
development, as opposed to rote memorization of facts.
Bruner favours extracting the essential principles from a
difficult task and apply them in familiar terms in simpler material the child
already knows. His work has expanded our sensitivity to how much a child can
learn at an early age.
Bruner believes that the basic intellectual skills should be
taught to the students at school, the aim of it being teaching the problem solving
than problem finding. One of the goals of education is making people better
thinkers. One can’t think in vacuum. So school instructions must be expanded in
foundation making. He believed curriculum should foster the development of
problem-solving skills through the processes of inquiry and discovery. He also
advocated teaching by organizing concepts and learning by discovery.
Bruner believes in thought internalised language and syntactical
rules of language rather than logic. He believed that subject matter should be
represented in terms of the child's way of viewing the world.
Cognitive development is conceived
more in terms of internalization of technologies from the culture. Language is
the most effective technology available.
He stresses on the fact by more advanced concepts can be taught
to the child at much earlier ages. Bruner’s motive is a theory of cognitive
development goes hand in hand with the theory of instruction. That curriculum
should be designed so that the mastery of skills leads to the mastery of still
more powerful ones.
He points out that the theory is prescriptive (rules for
achieving knowledge or skills and provides techniques for measuring or evaluating
outcomes). It is also normative (sets goals to be achieved and deals with
conditions for meeting them). Finally, he believed culture should shape notions
through which people organize their views of themselves and others and the
world in which they live.
Characteristics
of Instructions:
I.Predisposition:
Learner’s personal factors like interest, readiness, motivation
as well as cultural factors and teacher-student relationship are very much
concerned.
Natural learning is self-rewarding. It is very important to
satisfy curiosity and competence since are intrinsic motives. Reciprocity is
the final intrinsic motive relative to willingness of an individual to
cooperate.
Proper planning should be there from teachers’ side for the
predisposition of learning.
II.Relating knowledge to learner:
Curriculum should be in a way that corresponds to the mode of
representation at which students are functioning. It should involve structuring
subject matter in three ways:
1. Enactive mode.
2. Iconic mode.
3. Symbolic mode.
A theory of instruction should specify the ways in which a body
of knowledge should be structured so that it can be more readily grasped by the
learner.
1. Enactive Mode:
It is learning through actions. It is representing ideas through
actions. Child defines the events and objects in terms of action. E.g. like learning
to ride a bike. It is easier to mime or pretend a situation because these
events are more or less, muscle memories. It focuses on process than on the
product.
2. Iconic Mode:
It is learning based on representation through visual and perceptual
means. A child has a highly concrete imagery. A mental map that permits to
follow a route from where we are, to where we are going. The child can select
and organise his perception and work with ‘pictures’ which stand for perceptual
events.
3. Symbolic Mode:
Children develop abstract images because they are able to
translate experience into language and use language as an instrument of
thinking. E.g. verbalisation of the procedure of any experiment or phenomenon
observed. The most central system of symbolic activity is language. Examples of
symbols include maps, plans, roads and designs etc.
Teacher’s competence lies in how she/he relates knowledge to learners’
cognitive capacities.
III.Sequence:
There are certain orders of representing material and ideas
which are more likely to lead students to basic ideas or principles.
Instruction involves guiding learners through a series of statements and
restatements in a subject or field of knowledge; to enhance learning.
An optimum sequence is
one which progresses from:
E.g. flowcharts can teach a lot of information than a long list
of unrelated material.
IV.Reinforcement:
It refers to knowledge of results and feedback on the effects of
one’s action. Instruction should specify the nature and pacing of rewards and
punishments in the process of learning and teaching.
Bruner recommends gradual replacement of extrinsic rewards by
intrinsic rewards and replacement of immediate rewards by deferred awards. Its
usefulness depends on timing, to whom and where it is given or received.
Bruner attaches more importance to centrality of language in the
development of intelligence. He also thinks of cultural experiences as more
important in determining and shaping growth.
Implications on the learning process:
Bruner’s learning theory has direct
implications on the teaching practices which include:
1. Instruction must be appropriate to
the level of the learners. For example, being aware of the learners’ learning
modes (enactive, iconic and symbolic) will help teacher to plan and prepare
appropriate materials for instruction. This will help in addressing the difficult
aspects.
2. The teachers must revisit material to
enhance knowledge. Building on pre-taught ideas to grasp the full formal
concept is of paramount importance according to Bruner. Topics connected are
learnt quicker and grasped easily by the children due to familiarity.
3. Material must be presented in a
sequence giving the learners the opportunity to acquire and construct
knowledge, transform and transfer his/her learning.
4. Students should be involved in using
their prior experiences and structures to learn new knowledge. Teacher should help
students to categorize new information in order to able to see similarities and
differences between topics.
5. Teachers should assist learners in
building their knowledge.
6. Teachers should provide feedback that
is directed towards intrinsic motivation. Grades and competition are not
helpful in the learning process. Bruner states that learners must “experience
success and failure not as reward and punishment, but as information”.
