Giving Compass' Take:

• In the attempt to find the optimal learning strategy based on neuroscience, two apparently opposite methods have gained traction: one that prioritizes discovery-based learning and one that shuns it.

• How can both styles be incorporated into classrooms in order to allow students to use the method that works best for them?

• Here's a framework for high quality project-based learning. 


In recent years, there has been a lot more talk in Education about the science of learning. With developments in psychology and neuroscience, the thinking goes, we should be able to build a core body of knowledge on learning to inform how we teach and organize education. Efforts to synthesize this knowledge include the OECD report The Nature of Learning and the National Research Council’s How People Learn. When it comes to moving from knowledge to action, however, the learning sciences seem to break up into two different perspectives.

One is represented by the Innovative Learning Environments work that developed out of The Nature of Learning, and its seven principles emphasizing the personal and social aspects of learning. From this perspective, the most important tenet is that a learner has to actively engage in constructing their new knowledge and skills.

The second perspective views learning in terms of cognitive processing and emphasizes the role of working memory. A central tenet is John Sweller’s theory of “cognitive load”, based on sets of findings about how novices in a subject benefit from stripped back, explicit instruction, so as not to overburden their working memory. On the back of this, they stress the importance of prior knowledge and tend to be opposed to activities deemed too demanding, such as discovery-based learning.

Read the full article on the learning sciences by Amelia Peterson at Getting Smart.