Acquiring and Integrating Knowledge

Cognitive psychologists have learned a great deal about the way students acquire and integrate new knowledge. For instance, they know that students build new knowledge by relating it to prior learning and experience. They have found that the learning process for procedural knowledge (skills, procedures, and processes) is different from the process for declarative knowledge (facts, concepts, generalizations, and principles).

 Declarative Knowledge

Construct Meaning for Declarative Knowledge:

1. Help students understand what it means to construct meaning.

2. Use the three-minute pause.

3. Help students experience content using a variety of senses.

4. Help students to construct meaning for vocabulary terms.

5. Present students with the K-W-L strategy.

6. Create opportunities for students to discover the new information for themselves. (e.g., concept attainment)

7. Use instructional techniques that provide students with strategies to use before, during, and after they receive information. (e.g., reciprocal teaching; SQ3R)

Organize Declarative Knowledge:

1. Help students understand the importance of organizing information.

2. Have students use graphic organizers for the identified organizational patterns.

3. Provide students with advance organizer questions.

4. Present note-taking strategies that use graphic representations.

5. Have students create physical and pictographic representations of information.

6. Have students use graphs and charts.

Store Declarative Knowledge:

1. Help students understand the process of storing information.

2. Present students with the strategy of using symbols and substitutes.

3. Use the link strategy with students.

4. Use highly structured systems for storing information with students.

5. Provide students with mnemonics for important content.

 Procedural Knowledge

 

Construct Models for Procedural Knowledge:

1. Help students understand the importance of constructing models for procedural knowledge.

2. Use a think-aloud process to demonstrate a new skill or process.

3. Provide or construct with students a written or graphic representation of the skill or process they are learning.

4. Help students see how the skill or process they are learning is similar to and different from other skills or processes.

5. Teach students to mentally rehearse the steps involved in a skill or process.

Shape Procedural Knowledge:

1. Help students understand the importance of shaping procedural knowledge.

2. Demonstrate and create opportunities for students to practice using the important variations of the skill or process.

3. Point out common errors and pitfalls.

4. Help students develop the conceptual understanding necessary to use the skill or process.

Internalize Procedural Knowledge:

1. Help students understand the importance of internalizing procedural knowledge.

2. Help students set up a practice schedule.

3. Have students chart and report on their speed and/or accuracy when practicing new skills or processes.

 

Examples of DOL Graphic Organizers for Dimension 2

 

 

For additional information or assistance call the Community Instructional Specialist for your cluster or Antoinette Kellaher, Department of Staff Development, (301-805-2700).

The Dimensions of Learning Teachers' Manual

Observing Dimensions of Learning in Classrooms and Schools (Brown-ASCD), and related materials can be borrowed from the Bonnie Johns Teacher Resource Library (301-386-1605).

 

Click here for Dimensions of Learning Graphic Organizers Page

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