Exam 10: The Learning Sciences and Constructivism

Mr.Hester uses cooperative group activities every week in his middle school language arts classes.He believes that the social interactions involved in such activities shape students' learning.Which of the following theorists most likely influenced Mr.Hester's thinking?

The preschool children in Ms.Anderson's class love to use technology-everything from computers to smartphones and tablets.Parents of several children talk with pride about their child's techno savvy ways.Based on studies about the use of technology with young children,which parents boast about technology use that is NOT good for the child?

In science class,the teacher posed the question,"Can photosynthetic plants live without sunlight?" Students planted seeds,provided water and sunlight,and watched them grow.Now they are formulating hypotheses about the teacher's question,denying sunlight to their plants and collecting data day by day.At this point they are ready to discuss their evidence and draw conclusions.What teaching approach is being used in this classroom?

Mr.Phillips is grouping his fifth-grade students for a cooperative learning project that will span class periods for two weeks.He has 5 groups of four plus one group of three.He balanced the number of boys and girls in the groups and made sure the students who are perceived by their peers to be different were placed in a group together.What does he need to change about his groups?

Students in Mr.McKay's class are generating ideas about ways to deal with the problem of limited resources for the homeless high school students in their area.They are consulting a variety of resources and experts to represent multiple perspectives on the topic.They want their conclusions to be plausible and plan to invite the mayor to give feedback about their ideas.What approach is Mr.McKay using in this setting?

Tye got behind in physics after his basketball injury.He talked to his physics teacher and worked out a plan to get tutoring from the lab assistant.The tutor helped Tye catch up on understanding of concepts and also guided him through the experiments in the lab.Tye's approach to learning in this situation is an example of:

In conjunction with a unit on environmentalism,students in Ms.Stremmel's class placed recycle bins in three locations at school.They collect the recycled goods and take them to the recycling center every Friday after school.This is an example of:

The principal at Bragg Elementary School held a meeting in which he reminded teachers to create learning environments that represent constructivist perspectives.Which of the following environments is LEAST likely to meet the principal's expectations?

The students in Ms.Lemley's class are working on a project in which their collaborative groups take different positions on an issue related to the world economy.They conduct research and discuss ideas that support their positions.After each group presents its position and defense,the entire class discusses pros and cons of proposed positions.These students are involved in:

Many constructivist approaches to learning recommend five conditions for learning.In light of these five conditions,contrast traditional classroom teaching with teaching based on these constructivist conditions.

Ms.Moreno works with students at the upper elementary school level who are struggling to comprehend what they read in the content areas.Today,a group of her students is reading a passage in geography.After reading,one student pretends to be the teacher and asks the other three to summarize the passage.Next,the students generate questions to ask one another about the main idea.Then they clarify anything that was confusing and make predictions about what they will learn in the next section of the text.What procedure are these students using?

As a typical teen,Hanson spends more than 60 minutes a day on the Internet.He checks social media and Googles to find information for school.He gets distracted by links within sites and ads in the margins.As he multitasks,he follows links posted by friends and moves from one site to another.He often forgets what he reads when he skims so many different sites.This type of Internet searching often leads to:

Based on assumptions of the learning sciences,learning comes from:

In the following classrooms,which teacher's lesson plan is most likely to result in deep learning?

Students in Mrs.Davis's high school media class are designing instructional videos.Their target audience is students in grades 1-3.Their goal is to help these students use technology safely,wisely,and abide by rules of netiquette.As they finish developing a video lesson,they arrange to go into the classrooms in grades 1-3 and present the lesson to the children.After each lesson,the high school students discuss their reflections about the session.They look for ways to improve the lesson and transfer those types of changes to the next lesson.The attentiveness of the young children helps Mrs.Davis's high school students feel that they are making a difference. Is this an example of service learning? Explain why or why not on the basis of established characteristics of service learning.

What types of problems do students confront in problem-based learning?

Constructivist theories of learning usually agree on two central ideas.One central idea states that social interactions are important in the process of constructing knowledge.What is the other central idea?

Which of the following teachers incorporates one or more of the common elements of constructivist student-centered teaching?

Students in Mr.Morrow's sixth grade math class have provided math tutoring for students in the second grade.They conducted this service learning project for four weeks to use their math skills and meet needs of struggling young students.What additional learning activity must be involved for this project to exhibit the characteristics of service learning?

Mrs.Pollock wants to use the computers in her classroom to help her second grade students improve their math scores on achievement tests.Based on reviews about technology and learning,which of the following plans is most likely to help Mrs.Pollock meet her goal?