Understanding Student Thinking and Learning in the Classroom

Sociocultural Learning Theories and Information Literacy Teaching Activities in Higher Education

“…17 Cognitive constructivism focuses on students as individuals who "construct their own knowledge as they engage in the processes of interpreting and making sense of their classroom experience." 18 It ac-knowledges that new knowledge always is constructed and built on previous knowledge. This is a learner-centered approach, where the teacher aims to elicit and understand what previous knowledge each individual has and helps him or her construct new knowledge on top of it.…”

“…However, cognitive constructivism has been criticized for being too closely focused on the individual and ignoring the social and cultural context of learning. 19 In recent years, sociocultural learning theories have appeared in library literature. Simons, Young, and Gibson have adopted sociocultural learning theories to develop a learning library where students interact with information resources as directed by faculty, complete assignments and study with peers, extend their knowledge at multiple levels, and seek connections and make meaning in more self-directed ways.…”

Theorising teaching

“…Teaching involves communication and shared meaning making in which teachers and students co-construct a shared understanding within purposeful communication (Bell, 2005;Driver, Asoko, Leach, Mortimer & Scott, 1994;Nuthall, 1997).…”

“…Instead, I started with the widely held theory in the research literature that teaching can be theorised as a sociocultural practice, with the main goal of sociocultural theorising being to create an account of human thinking and action that recognises the essential relationships between mind and action, and their social, cultural and institutional settings (Nuthall, 1997;Wertsch, 1991;Wertsch, Del Rio & Alvarez, 1995). Hence, the sociocultural theorising of teaching creates an account of teacher thinking and action, recognising not only the relationship between mind and action, but also between mind/action and the social, cultural and institutional contexts in which teaching is done.…”

“What happens in my university classes that helps me to learn?” Teacher Education Students’ Instructional Metacognitive Knowledge

“…Such knowledge provides the skills and strategies for students' own learning, and also provides the basis for their future intentions, plans and actions as teachers, with a view to enhancing their prospective students' learning (Kerr, 1981). However, students' capacities to be self-regulated learners will be limited if their knowledge about what helps them to learn is impoverished (Kiewra, 2002;Nuthall, 1997;Winne, 1987;Winne & Marx, 1980), is restricted to declarative knowledge without elaborations to procedural and conditional knowledge (Anderson, 2005), or lacks incorporation into higher level, explicitly available, concepts (Chi & Roscoe, 2002) and mental models of teaching and learning (Karmiloff-Smith, 1992).…”