Constructivism is a theory of learning that states that past knowledge is the base on which new ideas will be built. This is in direct opposition to instructivism, which states that students have a ‘clean slate’ that must be filled with new ideas, mainly through instruction.
The phrase ‘active learning’ is key when it comes to constructivism, rather than ‘passive learning.’ Constructivism allows students to focus on real-life scenarios, not only giving them live context, but also enabling practical application of new ideas to familiar situations.
For constructivism to work, dialogue must be enabled and encouraged. The application of new ideas will present its own errors and experiments, and you should always give your students time to stop and assess what they are doing.
Constructivism in…
