Seymour. Planet Papert. The Daily Papert. Logo Foundation. Constructionism. Seymour Papert Seymour Papert defined constructionism in a proposal to the National Science Foundation entitled Constructionism: A New Opportunity for Elementary Science Education as follows: "The word constructionism is a mnemonic for two aspects of the theory of science education underlying this project.
From constructivist theories of psychology we take a view of learning as a reconstruction rather than as a transmission of knowledge. Then we extend the idea of manipulative materials to the idea that learning is most effective when part of an activity the learner experiences as constructing is a meaningful product. ".[2] As Papert and Idit Harel say at the start of Situating Constructionism, "It is easy enough to formulate simple catchy versions of the idea of constructionism; for example, thinking of it as 'learning-by-making'.
Here is one type of theory that constructivist learning theory can be applied in a classroom setting. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Jump up ^ Cakir, M. (2008). Constructionism. From OLPC Constructionism is a philosophy of education in which children learn by doing and making in a public, guided, collaborative process including feedback from peers, not just from teachers. They explore and discover instead of being force fed information, or subjected to a regime of social control as in the Prussian system adopted in the US and elsewhere, sometimes called Instructionism. Constructionist guidance has to be informed by a knowledge of what there is to explore and discover, including our ignorance, and of a variety of approaches that can be used for children at different developmental levels with various degrees of preparation.
More on this topic can be found by exploring Google using keywords such as "constructionism", "education", "philosophy". See for instance openworldlearning, Seymour Papert's website, , and the wikipedia article on constructionist learning. "I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. History and Examples Books and notes +/-
Tidying Up the Constructionist Suitcase. Constructionism has become a suitcase word. If we are to continue using the word we need to tidy up the suitcase because different sorts of fuzziness have crept in. So, what is in the suitcase, what should stay in and what should be taken out? Or is the word fuzzy by nature? One problem is religious aura or grandiosity. Constructionism is asserted to be the answer to all our problems regarding learning. It is allegedly superior to all other learning theories. Jean Piaget The reality is that learning theory is complicated, there are many learning theories, no learning theory that can clearly claim general superiority and schools to varying degrees do experiment and trial different approaches, albeit imperfectly. One possible response to this problem is to attempt to define constructionism. Does the OLPC represent such a design?
If constructionism is defined simplistically as learning by making and doing then such an approach might seem adequate. Piaget: Minnesota New Country School. Squeak. eToys.