Review by: Park, Jonghwi (2005-05-25)

This article is motivated both by the criticism that direct instruction approaches fail to encourage critical thinking and problem solving and by the premise that technology-enhanced student-centered learning environments (TESCLE) promote such processes. The article consists of: 1) an overview of TESCLE, 2) the five foundations of TESCLE and 3) 11 assumptions common to various TESCLE designs.

In an overview of the emergence of technology in student-centered learning environments, the authors assert that the role of technology in student-centered learning has recently extended to adapt to the evolving notions of partnership among learners and knowledge. That is, due to the prevalence of constructivism in educational research and practice, the learner has been seen as an important agent in learning processes, who is responsible for the construction of his/her own unique knowledge and rapid developments in technology promote the learner’s access to resources that facilitate such construction. To optimize the potential of both technology and learners, the author argues that an improved understanding of the foundations and underlying assumptions of TESCLE is needed.

In the second part, the authors identify the five foundations of various learning environments: psychological, pedagogical, technological, cultural and pragmatic. For each foundation, the authors introduce and compare distinct theoretical perspectives in varied learning environments, suggest the effective use of each foundation in designing TESCLE, and exemplify some of the well-known practical applications of the foundations. These foundations are functionally integrated in learning system design and mutually dependent. The more interdependent and the better integrated the foundations become, the greater the probability of success of the designed learning environment.

Based on the review of the five foundations, the third part of the article identifies the 11 assumptions common to various student-centered designs, such as “Traditional instruction is too narrow to support varied learning requirements,” “Understanding evolves continuously” and so on. According to the authors, these assumptions determine how the foundations are made operational in TESCLE and how the foundations and methods of learning environments change in accordance with the assumptions. The table summarizing the 11 assumptions is especially valuable in understanding the examples, functions, and associated research and theory of each assumption at a glance.

The authors conclude that TESCLE does not represent a dichotomous counterpart of direct instruction but rather a set of alternative approaches to fundamentally different learning goals. Only with sufficient understanding and development of the assumptions and foundations underlying TESCLE can we arrive at an effective strategy for promoting students’ reasoning, critical thinking and problem solving, thereby altering the quality of the learning environment.

It is undeniable that certain approaches proposed in the past are merely pseudo TESCLEs that do little more than rehash traditional approaches despite the valuable points that this article made almost a decade ago. It is therefore still timely for both designers and researchers to focus on the development of alternative foundations and assumptions for the effective learning environments we wish to create.