What does instruction look like in a constructivist classroom?
In a constructivist classroom instruction is active, student centered and inquiry based. The classroom is characterized by open-ended questions, group work, research, exploration, alternative assessment such as portfolios and narratives written by teachers, learning through problems, and interdisciplinary studies. Information processing theory also implies the classroom will be characterized by visual formats, focusing attention through signaling, clear purposeful assignments, variety, curiosity, surprise, asking questions, redirecting student inquiry, chunking of information, repetition and review, connecting to prior knowledge, concept maps, visual formats, focus on meaning, schemas, complex learning environment, spiral curriculum, mnemonics and multiple representation of knowledge. (See Woolfolk, ch. 9).
