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MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT CONSTRUCTIVISM
1. THERE'S LESS STRUCTURE AND THE TEACHER HAS LESS WORK
Actually, it is the lecture method that requires less time. Once
the lecture has been prepared, it can be repeated many times and, if followed
by a short answer test, the time spent correcting papers can be kept to a
minimum.
How does a teacher create the environment envisioned by Maria Montessori
when she said "The greatest sign of success for a teacher is to be able to
say 'The children are working as if I did not exist'"?
In a constructivist classroom, the time spent in preparation and
follow-through is significant. While the students may be working independently,
the good teacher is constantly monitoring all students and utilizing the
times when students are independently occupied to either work with a few
less students or to plan the next steps.
2. CONSTRUCTIVIST APPROACHES DO NOT BENEFIT ALL STUDENTS EQUALLY
This statement is generally offered by people who equate constructivism
with cooperative learning and who feel that cooperative learning only benefits
the poorer student.
Constructivist teaching strategies can include, but are not limited
to cooperative learning. A constructivist approach is designed to improve
students' ability to understand what they are studying, to think critically
and analytically and to be problem solvers. A constructivist approach helps
students to become independent, life long learners.
Cooperative learning, when implemented as a constructivist strategy
for learning, benefits the brighter student as well as the poorer student
because by teaching others, we gain a much deeper understanding of the information
we are sharing.
Also, people who feel that the brighter students do not benefit
from cooperative group work may be focusing only on content outcomes. Sometimes
the brightest students, academically, are the poorest students in terms of
outcomes such as effective communicating and working collaboratively. The
student who may be capable of only achieving a D in science may be an excellent
communicator whereas the science whiz who easily commands an A may be a shy,
inhibited communicator who can develop better interpersonal skills in a cooperative
setting.
3. WHEN COOPERATIVE LEARNING IS UTILIZED AS A CONSTRUCTIVIST TEACHING STRATEGY, STUDENTS ARE DISADVANTAGED
All can fail if one student doesn't do the work.
It harms the introvert.
We need to distinguish the quality of a teaching strategy from the
skill with which it is implemented. A teacher who creates a situation where
every member of a cooperative group can fail at a task if one member - in
ways beyond the control of other group members - subverts the work of the
group, has not effectively implemented cooperative learning.
Just as there are teachers who give poor lectures, there are teachers
who do not properly implement cooperative learning strategies. In fact, because
most teachers are inexperienced and have had little or no training in cooperative
learning and other constructivist strategies, there are countless examples
of inappropriate implementation. When criticisms of constructivist strategies
are expressed, it is important to assess whether the strategy itself was
inappropriate or just the implementation.
Inappropriate teaching of cooperative groups will occur with some
frequency as teachers strive to master what for many of them is a new strategy.
However, nothing worthwhile will ever emerge through the change process unless
we are prepared to endure a transition period while people are trained and
have time to adjust.
4. CONSTRUCTIVIST APPROACHES CREATE AN IMPOSSIBLE WORKLOAD
FOR TEACHERS
Initially, this is often true just as it is true that when one first
sits down with a computer there is a loss of productivity and an increase
in workload due to the newness of the equipment and techniques.
When a teacher first dives into performance tasks, rubrics and socratic
methods of inquiry, it is not appropriate to ask "Did it require substantially
more time than the way you used to teach?" Of course it did. Throughout all
our years of schooling and then teaching, we've experienced the same traditional
methods. Constructivism is new to most of us. Therefore, the appropriate
question is "How much of the extra time involved in a constructivist approach
will always be required and how much is due to our inexperience, the lack
of resources and other conditions which are temporary?'"
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