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Mayer's Designing Instruction for Constructivist Learning:
SOI Model (Select, Organize, and Integrate)
Constructivist learning environments emphasize the manipulation of the physical objects, but sometime it is not possible to develop a simulated environment for such manipulation. Mayer's SOI model can be complimentary under that situation. The model intends to foster understanding through direct instruction and it is suitable for text-based learning, lecture and multimedia environments, in which manipulation is not possible (Reigeluth, 1999).
Mayer's three views of learning
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Learning as Response Strengthening |
Learning as Knowledge Acquisition |
Learning as Knowledge Construction |
- Learning occurs as weakening or strengthening of an association between stimulus and response
- Role of the learner: reacting to reward and punishment
- Role of the teacher: administering reward and punishment
- Functions of the instruction: create a mechanism of stimulus-response-feedback; drill and practice
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- Learning occurs when the new information is placed in long-term memory.
- Role of the learner: receive and process information
- Role of the teacher: present information by lectures or textbooks
- Functions of the instruction: to present and transmit the information directed from the teacher or textbook to learner
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- Learning occurs when a learner actively constructs a knowledge representation in working memory.
- Role of the learner: the sense maker
- Role of the teacher: cognitive guide provides guidance and modeling on authentic academic tasks
- Functions of the instruction: to create meaningful interaction between the learners and the academic material, and to facilitate the learners' processes of selecting, organizing, and integrating information
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- Focus on rote learning, in which learners add behaviors or information into their memory
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- Focus on rote learning, in which learners add behaviors or information into their memory
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- Focus on constructive learning, an active learning, in which the learner possesses and uses a variety of cognitive processes during the learning process
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Mayer (1999) distinguished two kinds of active learning: behaviorally active learning, engaging in doing something without making sense of the actions or the objects; cognitive active learning, engaging sense making, such as self-explanation. He also classified three prerequisites for problem-solving transfer:
- Skill: Cognitive Processes (selecting, organizing, and integrating information)
- Metaskill: metacognitive and self-regulatory processes for planning, orchestrating, and monitoring)
- Will: Motivational and attitudinal aspects of learning
What is SOI model?
Let's examine Mayer's SOI model from four different aspects:
- Its theoretical foundation includes;
- Theory of constructivist learning, i.e. learner actively constructs knowledge representations in the working memory using both incoming material from the environment and prior knowledge in the long-term memory
- Information-Processing Theory
- Its instructional functions are to:
- Help learners to identify useful information
- Help learners to understand how the material fit together
- Help learners to see how the material related to prior knowledge
- Its implications to instructional design include:
- Design of instructional message, such as textbook passages, lecture and multimedia program
- The design issue focuses on "how to prime cognitive processes in learners that are needed for sense making, such as selecting, organizing, and integrating" (Mayer, 1999)
- Its suggestions of the methods
Select Material:
Help learners to focus on the relevant piece of information |
Organize Material:
Help to organize the incoming information into a coherent representation |
Integrate Material:
Help learners to activate and use prior knowledge and to activate and coordinate multiple representations of the materials |
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Highlight most important information for learners: using different text design techniques, such as bolding, heading, etc.
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Use instructional objectives or adjunct questions
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Provide a summary
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Eliminate irrelevant information: be concise |
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Structure of the text: comparison, classification, enumeration, generalization, and cause-effect
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Outlines
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Headings
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Pointer or signal words
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Graphic representations |
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References:
Mayer, R. H. (1999). Designing instruction for constructivist learning. In C. M. Reigeluth, (Eds.), In C. M. Reigeluth, (Ed), Instructional-design theories and models: A new paradigm of instructional theory, Volume II. pp,141-160. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Reigeluth, C. M. (1999). (Ed.), Instructional-design theories and models: An new paradigm of instructional theory, Volume II.. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Behaviorism
Cognitivism
Constructivism
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