1.
COGNITIVE
LEARNING
THEORY

2.
Basis and Focus
• Basis: Principles of cognitive psychology
• Focus: Role of cognitive processes in
learning

3.
Focus
• The mental processes involved in
learning:
– Observing, categorizing, forming
generalizations to make sense of the
information provided

4.
Main Assumptions
• Learning results from internal mental
activity and not from externally imposed
stimuli

5.
• The learner comes with knowledge, skills
and related experiences to the learning
situation

6.
Role of the Learner
• Active participant in the learning process,
using various strategies to process and
construct their personal understanding of
the content to which they are exposed

7.
Piaget, Bloom, Bruner, Ausubel
• Each of these psychologists focused on
different cognitive conditions that impact
on learning

8.
Jean Piaget
• Constructed models of child development
and the learning process
• Identified 4 developmental stages and the
cognitive processes associated with each
of them

9.
Developmental Stages
• Sensory-motor - understands his
environment through the basic senses
• Intuitive /Pre-operational - Thoughts
more flexible, memory and imagination
begin to play a part in learning, capable of
more creativity

10.
• Concrete Operational – Can go beyond
the basic information given, but still
dependent on concrete material and
examples to support reasoning
• Formal Operational – Abstract reasoning
becomes increasingly possible

11.
Accommodation
• Accommodation – The process by which
we modify what we already know to take
into account the new information

12.
Assimilation
• The process by which new knowledge is
changed / modified / merged in our minds
to fit into what we already know

13.
Equilibration
• The balance between what is known and
what is currently being processed,
mastery of the new material

14.
Implications for the Classroom
• Learning is the process of relating new
information with what was previously
learnt
• Learning is cumulative

15.
Implications
• Learners should be assigned tasks that
are age and stage appropriate

16.
Bloom’s Taxonomy
• Identifies and describes, in hierarchical
order, the cognitive processes involved in
learning

17.
Implication for Teaching
• Use verbs aligned to the taxonomy to plan
lessons that would ensure that learners’
cognitive skills develop from LOTS to
HOTS

18.
Revised Taxonomy
• The original taxonomy has now been
revised to make provision for the new
knowledge and skills that now exist as a
result of the integration of web 2.0 tools in
teaching

19.
Original and Revised
Taxonomies

20.
Bloom (Rev.) and Web 2.0

21.
Jerome Bruner - Focus
Development of conceptual
understanding, cognitive skills and
learning strategies rather than the
acquisition of knowledge

22.
Bruner’s Focus
• Teaching Approach - Learners should be
encouraged to discover solutions via
appropriate tasks which require the
application of relevant critical thinking
skills

23.
Bruner – Modes of Thinking
• Extended aspects of Piaget’s theory. He
identified three ways in which learners
process information

24.
• Enactive Level – learning takes place via
direct manipulation of objects and
materials

25.
• Iconic Level – Objects are represented by
visual images and are recognized for what
they represent

26.
• Symbolic Level – Learning can take
place using symbols, objects and mental
images. Language is used to represent
thoughts and experiences

27.
Implications for Teaching
• Providing opportunities for learners to be
actively engaged in making sense of the
language input, through meaningful tasks

28.
• Providing opportunities for learners to
develop the ability to analyze the
language, make generalizations about
rules, take risks in trying out the language,
and to learn from errors

29.
• Catering for interaction of learner with
curriculum material and the learning
environment
• Catering for the three modes of thinking
(Bruner)

30.
• The Spiral Process: The cumulative
nature of learning requires frequent
opportunities for reviewing previously
learnt material even as new material is
introduced.

31.
David Ausubel - Focus
• Stressed the importance of active mental
participation in meaningful learning tasks
• Learning must be meaningful to be
effective and permanent

32.
• Made a distinction between meaningful
learning and rote learning
• Meaningful Learning – relatable to what
one already knows so it can be easily
integrated in one’s existing cognitive
structure

33.
• Rote Learning – the material to be learnt
is not integrated / subsumed into an
existing cognitive structure but learnt as
isolated pieces of information

34.
Implications for Classroom
• Teacher has to enhance the
meaningfulness of new material to
increase the chances of its being
anchored to what is already known

35.
• New material must be organized to be
easily relatable to what is already known
• New material must be appropriately
sequenced to facilitate integration

36.
• Use of advance organizers. These
facilitate the learning process by providing
ideas to which the new knowledge can be
attached

37.
Advance Organizers
• Introductory material presented in
advance of the new material
• Information that activates relevant
background knowledge

38.
Advance Organizers
• Material that orients learners to the subject
matter and relates new learning to what is
already known
• Can take the form of textual material,
pictures, titles, topic summaries, questions

39.
Attention should be given to:
• The need to organize and structure
meaningful learning activities.
• The requirements of the task must be
appropriate to the developmental stage
(Piaget, Bruner) and allow for the
development of HOTS (Bloom)

40.
Moving from LOTS to HOTS