Piaget's Cognitive Constructivism Theory

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Piaget’s cognitive constructivism promotes the PBL approach since PBL makes learners acquire knowledge by doing hands-on projects with groups (Ntombela, 2015; Richhey, Klein & Monica, 2011; Simpson, 2011; Smith, 2015). It is apparent that the characteristics of constructivism theory, which are associated with a range of design features of language instruction, support the implementation of PBL. Constructivist learning changes passive learners to active learners who individually construct their knowledge and learning (Ntombela, 2015). With PBL approach, learners need to search, collect, filter necessary information, self-structured meaning from their learning in particular subject areas, and build perceived knowledge to problem-solving situations …show more content…

This mentions that learning is likely to occur in an internal process isolated from the social environment. Nevertheless, it is prevalently seen that in PBL learners frequently employ the power of collaborative learning skills in groups to culminate the projects or partake in social interactions with others for mutual learning discussions, so PBL also lend some characteristics of social-constructivism of Lev Vygotsky (1980). The salient point of social constructivism is the significance of social interactions that influence on the individual cognitive development and the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) as well as the role of scaffolding (Barge, 2010). He valued social interaction as an integral role in one’s cognitive development and argued that learning is not merely through assimilation and accommodation processes of new knowledge of learners, but it should be integrated or combined in a social community where learners can interact (Harmer, 2014). In other words, based on Vygotsky’s arguments, one’ s world knowledge is bound to his/her individual experiences while mediated by social interplay with

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