HOLY TRINITY COLLEGE OF GERNERAL SANTOS CITY

Fiscal Daproza Avenue, General Santos City

GRADUATE SCHOOL
2nd Semester 2020

ADVANCED PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION

(EDUC 200)

EDUCATIONAL THEORY

LADY ELAIZA P. ULAMA

MAEd- Educational Management

JOYCELYN JOYCE BERMUDEZ

Professor
EDUCATIONAL THEORY

“Constructivism is the recognition that reality is a product of human intelligence

interacting with experience in the real world. As soon as you include human mental
activity in the process of knowing reality, you have accepted constructivism.” – David
Elkind
Constructivism is an important learning theory that educators use to help their
students learn. Constructivism is based on the idea that people actively construct or
make their own knowledge, and that reality is determined by your experiences as a
learner. Basically, learners use their previous knowledge as a foundation and build on it
with new things that they learn. So everyone's individual experiences make their
learning unique to them. In elaborating constructivists’ ideas Arends (1998) states that
constructivism believes in personal construction of meaning by the learner through
experience, and that meaning is influenced by the interaction of prior knowledge and
new events. There are principles of constructivism that I truly believed in. First is
knowledge is constructed, rather than innate, or passively absorbed, this means that
constructivism's central idea is that human learning is constructed, that learners build
new knowledge upon the foundation of previous learning. Second is learning is an
active process which means, that learning is an active rather than a passive process.
The passive view of teaching views the learner as ‘an empty vessel’ to be filled with
knowledge, whereas constructivism states that learners construct meaning only through
active engagement with the world (such as experiments or real-world problem solving).
Information may be passively received, but understanding cannot be, for it must come
from making meaningful connections between prior knowledge, new knowledge, and
the processes involved in learning. Third is all knowledge is socially constructed, it
means that learning is a social activity, it is something we do together, in interaction with
each other, rather than an abstract concept (Dewey, 1938). For example, Vygotsky
(1978), believed that community plays a central role in the process of "making
meaning." For Vygotsky, the environment in which children grow up will influence how
they think and what they think about. Thus, all teaching and learning is a matter of
sharing and negotiating socially constituted knowledge. Fourth is all knowledge is
personal, it states that each individual learner has a distinctive point of view, based on
existing knowledge and values. Because constructivism is based on your own
experiences and beliefs, knowledge becomes a personal affair. Each person will have
their own prior knowledge and experiences to bring to the table. So the way and things
people learn and gain from education will all be very different. This means that same
lesson, teaching or activity may result in different learning by each pupil, as their
subjective interpretations differ. This principle appears to contradict the view the
knowledge is socially constructed. Fifth is learning exists in the mind, which means, hat
knowledge can only exist within the human mind, and that it does not have to match any
real world reality (Driscoll, 2000). Learners will be constantly trying to develop their own
individual mental model of the real world from their perceptions of that world. As they
perceive each new experience, learners will continually update their own mental models
to reflect the new information, and will, therefore, construct their own interpretation of
reality. Last is motivation is key to learning which states that students are unable to
learn if they are unmotivated. Educators need to have ways to engage and motivate
learners to activate their minds and help them be excited about education. Without
motivation, it’s difficult for learners to reach into their past experience and make
connections for new learning.
There are different types of constructivism that educators can use to find success with
this learning theory. First, the cognitive constructivism focuses on the idea that learning
should be related to the learner’s stage of cognitive development. These methods work
to help students in learning new information by connecting it to things they already
know, enabling them to make modifications in their existing intelligence to
accommodate the new information. Cognitive constructivism comes from the work of
Jean Piaget and his research on cognitive development in children. Second is the
Social constructivism focuses on the collaborative nature of learning. Knowledge
develops from how people interact with each other, their culture, and society at large.
Students rely on others to help create their building blocks, and learning from others
helps them construct their own knowledge and reality. Social constructivism comes from
Lev Vygotsky, and is closely connected to cognitive constructivism with the added
element of societal and peer influence. Third is the Radical constructivism is very
different from cognitive and social constructivism. It focuses on the idea that learners
and the knowledge they construct tell us nothing real, only help us function in our
environment. The overall idea is that knowledge is invented, not discovered. The things
we bring to the table make it impossible for us to have truth, only interpretations of
knowledge. This theory was developed by Ernst von Glasersfeld in 1974.
To sum it up, it’s important to understand how teachers can apply
constructivism inside their classroom to create a unique learning environment for
students. The teacher has a role to create a collaborative environment where students
are actively involved in their own learning. Teachers are more facilitators of learning
than actual instructors. Teachers must work to understand the preexisting conceptions
and understanding of students, then work to incorporate knowledge within those areas.
Teachers will also need to adjust their teaching to match the learner’s level of
understanding. It promotes student agency. It develops advanced skills such as critical
thinking, analysis, evaluation, and creation. It promotes diverse viewpoints. It
encourages students to reflect, evaluate their work, and identify intermediary skills to
acquire based on their needs.