Teachers College, Columbia University
Cognition and Computers

Mauricio Miraglia mem2009@columbia.edu
A Constructivist Learning Environment Model for the Learning of English as a Foreign Language. October 2001

I.Overview
In my previous paper I focused on the teaching of reading for the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) and how the implementation of diverse knowledge representations could enhance the learning process of reading skills in learners of English as a foreign language.  I would like to expand on the context of language learning and present through this paper a first approach to a constructivist design model in the domain of EFL (English as a foreign language).  This paper examines seven guidelines on how to build a constructivist learning environment giving theoretical evidence from the bibliography required for Cognition and Computers followed up by examples for application of these guidelines.  The paper also suggests a method of assessment for learners as well as an evaluation of the learning environment in terms of how successfully users and the learning environment interact with one another and how this model would facilitate the learning process.

II.Domain
I will focus on designing an EFL course at an intermediate level with an emphasis on reading and writing skills for undergraduate students of Journalism in a private university in Santiago de Chile. 
In order to define specific topics and better situate this paper Nova Language Consultants (www.nlc.cl), an EFL consultancy office and language school based in Santiago de Chile, has provided me with a general 3-level course program they have implemented at Universidad del Desarrollo.  Please refer to the appendix to see a sample of one of the courses in more detail.
This course typically known as “Instrumental English 2” aims at developing specific language skills (reading and writing mainly) using selected reading passages from the students’ field of study.
General objective of sample course
Currently the class meets once a week for 1.5 hours for over 4 months (one term).  In addition, this course - conceived as intermediate in the level of language performance - is preceded by a basic level course and followed by an upper intermediate course of the same kind.  The mode of the class is basically classroom based with one instructor and an average class of 30 students. 
In the following section of this paper we will suggest guidelines to create a constructivist learning environment applicable to possibly refashion the kind course just described.

III.Definition of Constructivist Design Model

A.  Underlying notions
As a starting point it is reasonable to define how a learning environment is viewed in this proposal.  According to Wilson (Wilson, Ch 1 p 5) a learning environment can be “a place where learners may work together and support each other as they use a variety of tools and information resources in their guided pursuit of learning goals and problem solving activities.”   In addition, from Wilson’s definition we can think of a learning environment as composed of learners and tools.  It can be added that in an environment for learning languages there must be a community of learners and instructors immersed in a larger social entity where the target language is used naturally in diverse ways and for a myriad of purposes.  This immersion can be accomplished by using the channels available in the context of the learners.  If –as in the case of EFL- the learners and instructors are limited by the environment where English is not spoken, the learning environment must bring real instances of communication with other native and non native users of the language.  I refer to users of the language rather than speakers because in EFL speaking is considered only one ability to develop for communication –though it can be probably acknowledged as a critical skill for effective communication.
A notion of what knowledge and learning are can also provide substance for the application of a constructivist approach.  Knowledge within the constructivist paradigm can be conceived as mental models that individuals form in their mind out of the experience, exploration and interaction with the environment (people, objects, artifacts, culture) and consequently learning may be thought of as the construction of these mental models and the continuous accommodation or redefinition of these models as a result of further interaction with the environment.  From this perspective, instructional design carefully considers modes of knowledge representation involved rather than the description of behaviors learners should achieve (Black, Introduction to Knowledge-Based Instructional Design).  At the same time, learning goes on well beyond the classroom and across the life span comprising the construction of meaning in multiple domains and perspectives.  From the point of view of language learning perhaps an important characteristic of the learning process is the construction of interpretations individuals perform as they attempt to make sense of symbols, structures and functions which operate in a language system.
 
B. Guidelines and applications for a constructivist learning environment

1-Immersion
Learning a foreign language involves the interaction of individuals in various contexts in life making sense of new codes and symbols and coming up with appropriate interpretations for response and interaction with other members, objects, artifacts, media and oneself.  From what is known in applied linguistics as the direct method back in the 60s the trend has been to use the target language as the primary means of instruction.  With more functional and communicative approaches in vogue in the 80s and 90s using the target language in classrooms contexts has become a standard principle amongst EFL educators.  Immersion as conceived by the Berlitz method has a long history as well yet it differs radically from the concept put forward in this proposal.  It is needless to describe how impractical or unrealistic it can be to take 1,000 college students during a whole term on a “field trip” to an English speaking country to learn the language.   Immersion here relates to providing the students with situated learning contexts as proposed by the Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt (CTGV), providing rich and “ill structured” situations and as stated by Young, Nastasi & Brauhardt, providing a learning experience  in “realistic problem situations, provided  through interactive video and extended through telecommunications […] based less on memory and more on the tuning of perception, drawing on the psychology of James Gibson (1979/1986)” (Wilson Ch 10 Implementing Jasper Immersion, p. 129)  The CTGV suggests that in a natural environment knowledge is not the end but as a matter of fact a means to resolve complex tasks or problems.  Immersion, consequently, allows EFL students to contextualize their learning process, fosters the sense of having a common set of reference from where to draw meanings and interpretations, provides a multi sensorial experience of the target language and perhaps most importantly gives the learners authentic reasons to use their constructions and knowledge.
In the case of the students addressed in this paper, the current program does provide a general frame of reference, the “journalism domain”, yet that can be still rather vague and falls short in specifying and probably implementing a situation where students can be immersed to use their knowledge of the language.  A possible application of the immersion concept could be to situate the students in a magazine or newspaper office headquarters where all members of the class can take on different responsibilities to finally accomplish the task of publishing a newsletter / journal or magazine for the School of Journalism.  At a larger scale the context could consider a virtual city where journalists can move around getting out in the field to later write stories and communicate them to the public.  This immersion concept would convey the use of computers to provide rich media contexts with video, audio, text and hypertext files.  In addition, by implementing a database connected to the campus library and news agents this immersion could expand to multiple disciplines and gain presence in the learners’ daily activities breaking the traditional linearity of a classroom and making tasks evolve on a daily basis as opposed to the current time constraint they have.

2-Construction of Meaning
A critical and controversial issue in EFL is the construction of meaning.  In such a complex domain researchers and educators still debate as to whether meaning is constructed by study and rote memorization, association of graphemes, phonemes, visual imagery and realia, and / or use of semantic webs to name some.  In this model the construction of meaning is conceived as the capacity learners can develop to actually fill in the gaps in rich and complex models of communication. 
From the principles of minimal instruction highlighted in J.B. Black, J.M. Carroll and S.M. McGuigan’s What kind of minimal instruction manual is the most effective?” (1987) it is possible to infer the importance of inference and appropriate reference in language learning leaving students the task to fill in the gaps of a given content. The fact that Inferential Manuals and Skeletal Manuals proved more effective than the Lengthy Manual may give light on the value of previous knowledge to tackle the construction of meaning in reading comprehension activities.  In addition, meaning can be viewed as a negotiation of what goes on in a given context, a specific artifact or the construct to interpret and the background knowledge and beliefs learners have in their minds.  The ICON Model (J. Black & McClintock) gives a clear example of how meaning construction operates in a Study Support Environment. Rich and significant environments relying on multiple information banks would allow students to explore complex scenarios from where they could draw inferences and make sense and use of the new information they encounter.  As an example of how this concept of meaning construction would operate, in this EFL course for students of journalism, they could explore a city being threatened by a biological attack.  The students in this environment would need to collect and report on information related to the causes, development and effects of such an attack.  By approaching local authorities, security experts, scientific researchers and common people in various settings (schools, workplaces and the street, for example) they would need to represent the case of biological threat and deal with the topic from multiple perspectives and in its different language manifestations and styles (language style, jargon, language structure).   Words and concepts pertaining to this specific topic –biological threats- would be presented through multiple channels giving students the chance to make a broader and deeper understanding of the language.

3-Use of Multiple Representations of Knowledge
J. Black’s Types of Knowledge Representation (CCT Report 92-3) highlights four major notions of knowledge.  Declarative knowledge “knowing that something is the case” can represent rather static information and data in the real world while procedural knowledge, “knowing how to” can help us represent the procedures of how a given case or entity operates.  Pixel coordinate representations can allow us to better visualize systems while metacognitive knowledge will help us understand those systems and their underlying mental models accounting for reasons or why something functions one way or another.   The use of declarative, procedural, pixel coordinate and metacognitive knowledge in a learning environment will allow students to access knowledge from multiple perspectives and will foster a deeper understanding in any domain we are engaged in.  In the case of EFL, providing an opportunity for multiple representations can help learners grasp the multiple manifestations of language, cultures, and the mind.  Brenda Surgrue (Lajoie, Ch 5) cites Flavel (1979) to account for the use of computers as cognitive tools and states that computer environments support cognitive processes such as “[the] acquisition of declarative knowledge, connecting knowledge to situational conditions that trigger proceduralization, refining and constructing shared understanding, and metacognitive monitoring of knowledge acquisition to ensure accuracy and efficiency.”  It can be stated that using multiple representations will allow then students to learn the language with a focus on its functions, purposes and intentions at the same time they can refine their use of the target language by understanding the underlying mechanisms and patterns as found in real contexts and for authentic tasks.
The concept of multiple representations can be applied in this case by providing students with tools to represent particular contents.  If they need to report on the characteristics of biological weapons, they might use propositional networks, a productions system with if / then rules, videos, graphics and animations to visualize the structure of certain bacteria and a mental model of how to prevent infections accounting for actions to prevent infection or serious public health risks.  Further examples of how these representations of knowledge operate in today’s news reports can be found in sites such as www.cnn.com  or www.latercera.cl

4-Anchored Tasks
Each experience can lead to different assimilations of what is learned Savery and Duffy put forward that “we cannot talk about what is learned separately from how it is learned, as if a variety of experiences all lead to the same understanding […] what we understand is a function of the content, the context, the activity of the learner and perhaps most importantly the goals of the learner […] Understanding is in our interactions with the environment.”  (Wilson Ch 11, p 136)
Anchoring the learning tasks in the students’ experiences within the learning environment can give a real sense of purpose for problem solving processes and for the generation of knowledge as a tool to solve those problems addressed.  Anchored learning can bond the content with a realistic context and the tasks to be performed.
In our EFL course for journalism undergraduates the experience can be anchored by presenting the current issues taking place in the virtual city to subsequently describe duties and responsibilities that each member of the class will need to perform through out the course.  The students would sort out a plan of action in order to come up with their final product. The instructor could intervene with guidance in scaffolding the tasks and subtasks regarding language complexity of the contexts involved.

5-Collaboration
Both language and learning can be considered social activities in the sense that they take place primarily within a community.  Within this model meaning and understanding are thought to be constructed as a result of constant interaction with the environment.  Collaboration is then a central concept, since it is through the development of a shared space, communication tools and a common language that learners can interact with one another and refine, modify and expand their knowledge.  Wilson (Ch 2) suggests learning should be embedded in social experience as part of a set of pedagogical suggestions for instructional design and states that “communities of learners work together in projects and learning agendas, supporting and learning from one another, as well as from the environment.” (Wilson, Ch 1 p.5)  Examples such as the classroom based SOCRATES Curriculum and the open virtual environment of the Lab Design Project account for the value of collaborative environments in which students become a community of practice, building knowledge as a tool for problem solving processes. 
A collaborative environment could be designed for the EFL course by proving interactive communication tools.  Chat rooms and message boards designed with visual representation tools of each member’s contributions as in CSILE, can greatly facilitate communication and interaction within the class members and with experts in the field out side of the school context.  With the implementation of portable computers and PDAs students could interact with the information banks and elements of the virtual city and newspaper office HQ as they come across information of value for their tasks.  At the same time, the system could “page” them at any point in time to remind them of tasks or to ask them for help or extra work in case other members have triggered problems that need urgent attention in the system.  In this sense, collaborative work makes all members responsible for individual work at the same time their work is affecting the progress of the final product as a system.  In fact, telecommunication tools can make EFL learning go well beyond the classroom context and make up for the lack of English presence in EFL city environments. 

6- Learners’ Ownership
Learners can be empowered by the creative use of technology, making their own representations of knowledge and manipulating the environment. Papert’s notion of constructionism brings about this concept of learners’ ownership. Papert (http://www.media.mit.edu ) believes that people learn by actively constructing their knowledge and in fact the author believes it is important for learners to come up with a concrete product that can be shared by members of a learning community.  From the perspective of hypermedia education Erickson and Lehrer state that “authoring a hypermedia document, like authoring any other text, involves juggling or negotiating a large number of constraints, like thinking what to say, translating ideas to text, and dealing with rhetorical goals regarding audience and purpose” (Lajoie Ch 7 p. 198) The use of hypermedia and authoring tools can importantly enhance language learning especially in reading and writing processes by challenging students to make multiple representations, associations and active use of the target language in the creation of their own products.  In our EFL course the learners would be involved with coming up with their own products within the final end product (be it a magazine, newspaper or the like).  The students would start taking ownership from the beginning by setting up their own goals and writing their own agenda of tasks to accomplish.  The crucial element is to encourage to take ownership of whatever they decide their final product to be throughout all stages of the learning environment and the course so they perceive themselves as authors rather than passive recipients.( Lajoie Ch 7)

7-Dynamic Learner Centered Assessment
Computers as Cognitive Tools (Lajoie 2000) suggests the implementation of dynamic assessment as opposed to traditional assessment of learning.  The latter typically tests learners in isolation and deprived from tools and resources that are commonly found in real life.  Examples of this kind of traditional assessment could be the SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) or TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language).  These modes of assessment view learning largely as an end product and heavily on declarative knowledge.  In the EFL domain this turns out into testing learners against a defined set of grammar structures, lexical items, functions and language skills according to prescribed course objectives, sub goals, skills and topical contents.
According to Schwartz (Lajoie Ch 10, p 274 – 275), “dynamic assessments can elicit information about learning preparedness or learning potential an also about instructional resources particularly effective for an individual.” From this perspective assessment becomes a central part of a constructivist model and the learning experience since it allows learners and the learning environment to better interact with each other according to the learner’s goals, needs and interests.  In addition, dynamic assessment provides guidance for initial and further implementation of resources in the system and feedback for the learner on the process of learning as immersed in an authentic context.  A possible method of assessment for learners is suggested in the next section of this paper.

 

 

IV.Assessment
The process of assessment is meant to be embedded in the learning environment and to become another learning tool for learners, instructors and the learning environment. Within this view this suggested model seeks to assess contextualized learning processes rather than isolative declarative knowledge.
We will distinguish between the assessment of the learners’ learning process from the evaluation of the learning environment.
A.Assessing Learners
A complete operational definition of assessment criteria in the studied EFL domain goes beyond the scope of this paper yet the following four aspects attempt to guide the implementation of dynamic assessment following Schwartz’s conception of dynamic assessment (Lajoie 2000).

1-Learners’ preparedness: we need to measure the students’ background knowledge and skills within a constructivist perspective, that is, it is important to identify the learner’s knowledge of the world and other cultures, previous studies of the target language or any other language, communication skills they already have (for example we could detect the kind of texts learners usually read, frequency and medium / media preferred, whether they are able to speak in public or  shy away from it). 
2-Learners’ potential: The assessment should be constructed as a part of the learning environment he is or will be immersed in.  It is important to design problem solving tasks involving inference and interpretation skills requiring collaboration and higher order thinking as well as other features present in the learning environment.
3-Learner’s technology and media literacy: measuring their abilities with technology can help the system adapt to the learners’ skill level.  Measuring visual literacy, ability to understand and construct propositional and systems networks can also give light on how well they can perform in representing knowledge.
4-Learner’s cognitive strategies (not style) Measuring the ability to decode, process, store, elaborate, infer and interpret language symbols in rich contexts can give us a hint on how the learners are using an array of cognitive skills desired to develop by the particular learning environment designed for the course.

B.The learning environment
The learning environment should be evaluated by all the interacting members who also constitute part of the learning environment. Designers, instructors and learners should have the instance to feedback on the learning environment at any point when problems occur as well as in more formal or predetermined instances such as the end of the course.  The criteria to evaluate this learning environment should perhaps revolve around the questions
-How is learning taking place? Under what conceptions of knowledge and learning?
-How have the model principles been shaped into the system and become active tools or representations for the construction of meaning and resolution of problems?
-How easy or difficult is the interaction of the members with the learning  environment? It is hoped that class members can interact better by means of the learning environment and not in spite of it.
Since probably the best assessment happens in the every day use of the system, it is necessary to harness the learning environment with tools for immediate report and feedback on all aspects of the working system.

V.Summary
This paper has outlined seven guidelines for the design of a constructivist learning environment.  By providing examples and reference to the EFL course for journalism it is intended to provoke further discussion and research on how to re design current curriculum not only in EFL but in all other domains.  Re fashioning existing courses seems to be a simplistic way of taking on a constructivist stand.  It is necessary to reflect on the notions of reality, knowledge and learning, origins and development of pedagogical practices to later implement new tools that will facilitate and deepen the learning process of students in various settings from K-12, higher education and continuing education.  Learning as conceived in this model is the activity of constructing meaning and making interpretations in shared common spaces using multiple representations of knowledge and collaborative tools to anchor a problem solving situation in meaningful and naturally complex contexts.  Most of the research done on implications of a constructivist model has been in the science domain.  Let us hope in the coming years we can do deeper research in foreign language learning so multiple constructivist models can be applied and tried out in classroom contexts.

 

VI. Bibliography  and References

J.R. Anderson, (2000), Cognitive Psychology and Its Implications, Fifth Edition, Worth Publishing.
S.P. Lajoie, (2000) Computers as Cognitive Tools, Vol. II. LEA.
B.G. Wilson, Constructivist learning environments.  Educational
Technology Publications, 1996.
The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt, (1997) The Jasper Project.
http://peabody.vanderbilt.edu/ctrs/ltc/Research/jasper_overview.html
www.media.mit.edu
www.microworlds.com
www.ils.nwu.edu
Engines for Education website

 

 

APPENDIX

This program is part of the EFL curriculum implemented by Nova Language Consultants at Universidad del Desarrollo.  Nova Language Consultants has generously allowed me to use this program.  NLC holds intellectual property on this information.

UNIVERSIDAD DEL DESARROLLO
Facultad de Periodismo
Inglés Instrumental

    PROGRAMA DE ESTUDIOS
(not available on the web format)

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