Clt session for erasmus

1. Cognitive Load Theory
•John Sweller
Doing it well – Doing it right

2. Today’s session
• A brief introduction to CLT and other areas of
educational research and practice that link to CLT
Doing it well – Doing it right

3. Doing it well – Doing it right
Cognitive Load Theory - models
Willingham (2009)

4. Doing it well – Doing it right
Cognitive Load Theory - models
Reif (2008)

5. Doing it well – Doing it right
Reif Model
Boxer(2018)

6. Doing it well – Doing it right
Reif Model
Boxer(2018)

7. Doing it well – Doing it right
Reif Model
Boxer(2018)

8. Reif Model
Boxer(2018)
Doing it well – Doing it right

9. Doing it well – Doing it right
Reif Model
Boxer(2018)

10. Reif Model
Doing it well – Doing it right
Boxer(2018)

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Implications on our practice
This research highlights
• the importance of considering cognitive science when
approaching pedagogy
• How we must find a balance when considering how we
present content, allow students time to process and
practice the knowledge and allow for the transfer to
happen from WM to LTM

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CLT in every day practice
• The research suggests the importance of
understanding how different learning
activities can hinder the learning process for
our students or affect the different areas of
load mentioned

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CLT in every day practice
• It also emphasizes the importance of
teachers understanding how learner
memory works to ensure pedagogy is
effective

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CLT in every day practice
• It has links with other scholars and their work
in education including that of Barak
Rosenshine and his ‘Principles of Instruction’
and Dunlowsky’s ‘interleaved practice’

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Powerpoint overload…
• I revisited some of my own power-point
resources after attending Steve Hickman’s
excellent inset on CLT and when I was first
introduced to CLT

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Summary
• The main goal of cognitive load theory (CLT) is to
optimize learning of complex tasks by efficiently
using the relation between the limited WM and
unlimited LTM. (Paas, F. and Ayres, P. 2014)

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Discussion points
• What are your initial thoughts on CLT?
• Is there any area of the research that you need more clarification on?
• Does this area of research and the case studies raise questions for your pedagogy?
• Could areas of your curricula be tweaked to ‘lighten’ the cognitive load?

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Bibliography
Boxer, A. (2018) Simplifying Cognitive Load Theory
https://achemicalorthodoxy.wordpress.com/2018/10/25/simplifying-cognitive-load-theory
Centre for Education Statistics and Evaluation, NSW Department of Education (2017) Cognitive load theory: research
that teachers really need to understand. https://www.cese.nsw.gov.au//images/stories/PDF/cognitive-load-theory-
VR_AA3.pdf
Reif, F. (2008). Applying cognitive science to education: thinking and learning in scientific and other complex domains.
MIT press.
Paas, F. and Ayres, P. (2014). Cognitive Load Theory: A Broader View on the Role of Memory in Learning and Education.
Educational Psychology Review, [online] 26(2), pp.191-195. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43549791
[Accessed 24 Oct. 2018].
Rosenshine, B. (2012) Principles of Instruction: Research based principles that all teachers should know. American
Educator, Spring 2012. http://www.aft.org/pdfs/americaneducator/spring2012/Rosenshine.pdf
Sweller, J. (2010). Element Interactivity and Intrinsic, Extraneous, and Germane Cognitive Load. Educational Psychology
Review, [online] 22(2), pp.123-138. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/ [Accessed 25 Oct. 2018].
Willingham, D. T. (2009). Why Don’t Students Like School?. AMERIcAN EdUcATOR, 5.