Post on 07-Nov-2014
description
Meaningful Reception Learning
Ausubel
David P. Ausubel was born in 1918 Attended the University of Pennsylvania, taking the pre-medical course and majoring in Psychology In 1973 he retired from academic life to devote full time to his psychiatric practice His principal interests in psychiatry have been general psychopathology, ego development, drug addiction, and forensic psychiatry
In contrast to Bruner, Ausubel believed that people acquire knowledge primarily through RECEPTION, NOT DISCOVERY.
Profile
The overarching idea in Ausubel's theory is that knowledge is hierarchically organized; that new information is meaningful to the extent that it can be related (attached, anchored) to what is already known.
Ausubel stresses meaningful learning, as opposed to rote learning or memorization; and reception, or received knowledge, rather than discovery learning. (Ausubel did not contend that discovery learning doesn't work; but rather that it was not efficient.)
Expository Teaching stresses what is known as Meaningful Verbal Learning – verbal information, ideas, and relationships among ideas, taken together.
Rote memorization is not meaningful learning, because material by rote is not connected with existing knowledge.
Concepts, principles, and ideas are presented and understood using DEDUCTIVE REASONING- from general ideas to specific cases.
Meaningful Reception Learning
Advance Organizers
Ausubel’s strategy always begins with an ADVANCE ORGANIZER.
This is an introductory statement broad enough to cover or include all the information that will follow.
3 Purposes:They direct your attention to what is important in
the coming material,They highlight relationships among ideas that
will be presentedThey remind you of relevant information you
already have
Advance Organizers
2 Categories
1.Comparative2.Expository
Expository
While presenting new materialUse beginning of lessonPresents several encompassing
generalizations where detailed contents will be added later
Example: In an English class, you might begin a large thematic unit on
rites of passage in literature with a very broad statement of the theme and why it has been so central in literature—something like, “A central character coming of age must learn to know himself or herself, often makes some kind of journey of self-discovery, and must decide what in the society is to be accepted and what rejected.”
Comparative
Comparative organizers activate (bring into working memory) already existing schemas.
They remind you of what you already knowExample: A comparative advance organizer for a history
lesson on revolutions might be a statement that contrasts military uprisings with the physical and social changes involved in the Industrial Revolution; you could also compare the common aspects of the French, English, Mexican, Russian, Iranian, and American Revolutions (Salomon & Perkins, 1989).
Ausubel’s Meaningful Learning
Meaningful Reception
Learning Theory
Meaningful Reception
Learning Theory
Concerned with how students learn large amounts of meaningful material from verbal/textual presentations in learning activities
Learning is based on the representational, superordinate and combinatorial processes that occur during the reception of information.
A primary process in learning is subsumption in which new material is related to relevant ideas in the existing cognitive structure on a non-verbatim basis (previous knowledge)
Meaningful learning results when new information is acquired by linking the new information in the learner's own cognitive structure
The Processes of Meaningful Learning
Derivative subsumptionCorrelative subsumption Superordinate learningCombinatorial learning
Derivative Subsumption
This describes the situation in which the new information you learn is an example of a concept that you have already learned.PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE : Let's suppose
you have acquired a basic concept such as "tree” – has green leaves, branches, fruits
You learn about a kind of tree that you have never seen before “persimmon tree” (an edible fruit that resembles a large tomato and has very sweet flesh) - that conforms to your previous understanding of “tree’’
Your new knowledge of persimmon tree is attached to the concept of tree, without substantially altering that concept in any way
Correlative Subsumption
This is more "valuable" learning than that of Derivative Subsumption, since it enriches the higher-level concept.
•Now, let's suppose that you encounter a new kind of tree that has red leaves,
rather than green
• In order to accommodate this new information, you have to alter or extend your concept of tree to include the possibility of
red leaves.
Superordinate Learning
In this case, you already knew a lot of examples of the concept, but you did not know the concept itself until it was taught to you.
This is Superordinate Learning (a thing that represents a superior order or category within a system of classification).
Imagine that you were well acquainted with maples, oaks, apple trees, etc., but you did not know, until you were taught, that these were all examples of deciduous trees. (of a tree or shrub) shedding its leaves annually.
Combinatorial Learning
The first three learning processes all involve new information that "attaches" to a hierarchy at a level that is either below or above previously acquired knowledge.
Combinatorial learning is different; it describes a process by which the new idea is derived from another idea that is neither higher nor lower in the hierarchy, but at the same level (in a different, but related, "branch").
You could think of this as learning by analogy.
For example, to teach someone about pollination in plants, you might relate it to previously acquired knowledge of how fish eggs are
fertilized.
General ideas of a subject (general statement): Must be presented first then progressively differentiated in terms of
detail and specificity.
Instructional materials : should attempt to integrate new material with
previously presented information Using comparisons and cross-referencing of new
and old ideas.
Principles of Ausubel's Meaningful Reception Learning
Theory within a classroom setting
Principles of Ausubel's Meaningful Reception Learning
Theory within a classroom setting
Advance organizers : Instructors could incorporate advance
organizers when teaching a new concept
Examples : Instructors could use a number of examples and
focus on both similarities and differences.
Principles of Ausubel's Meaningful Reception Learning
Theory within a classroom setting
Principles of Ausubel's Meaningful Reception Learning
Theory within a classroom setting
Instructional Implications
Ausubel's theory is not particularly in vogue today, perhaps because he seems to advocate a fairly passive role for the learner, who receives mainly verbal instruction that has been arranged so as to require a minimal amount of "struggle".
Nevertheless, there are some aspects of his theory that you might find interesting, can you name some?
Exercise:
Strengths of the model
Weaknesses of the model
Bruner’s Discovery Model
Ausubel’s Expository Teaching Model