Building on New Constructivist Ideas and CmapTools to Create a New Model for Education 1

Abstract

Abstract. There is today almost universal agreement that every learner must construct her/his own knowledge structure, or cognitive structure, through her/his own efforts. The commitment to building a powerful knowledge structure must be the learner’s commitment. There is less universal recognition that knowledge structures are built primarily through meaningful learning, and by contrast, rote learning or simply memorizing information contributes little to building a person’s knowledge structure. We believe that Ausubel’s cognitive learning theory (Ausubel, 1963, 2000) provides a strong foundation on which to improve teaching and learning. We shall seek to illustrate this through efforts that employ constructivist epistemology and constructivist cognitive psychology, together with the use of the Internet and CmapTools, a software toolkit to aid in the construction of concept maps. CmapTools can serve as the foundation for a new kind of integration of Internet resources and all classroom, laboratory, and field experiences, and when used with “expert skeletal ” concept maps to scaffold learning, they provide for a New Model for Education. 1

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