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complex as judging emotions from diary entries, there should be ample room for some alternate
interpretations. At the end of this chapters, there are other lessons that aim to be constructivist for
you to evaluate.Applying Constructivist Theory to Teaching Vocabulary
Constructivists do not write much about vocabulary instruction because in general, directed
vocabulary instruction is inconsistent with the seven principles laid out above. Studying vocabulary as a
separate, isolated activity is not an authentic task. Architects, engineers, and doctors do not spend part of
their working days studying lists of vocabulary words. All of them no doubt continue to learn words, but
they do so in the context of other activities. For instance, doctors continue to learn new words as they read
journal articles to keep up to date with the latest practices in their field, which they do to treat their
patients more effectively.
Constructivists would quickly point out that people learn the vast majority of the words they know
through incidental learning—learning by picking up the meaning from context. Given that this is the
natural way that humans learn words, most constructivists would avoid directed vocabulary instruction
and instead have students learn meanings of words by engaging in other, more authentic activities, just as
professionals do in their work. For example, students learn vocabulary through engaging in authentic
problems that require the use of new words.
CHAPTER 2 SUMMARYINFORMATION PROCESSING THEORY
Information processing theory is a theory of human learning that postulates that information is moved
to and from different memory stores.
The memory stores are the sensory register, short-term memory, and long-term memory
Information is stored in a long-term memory store, after which they can retrieve the information to
solve problems, reason, or learn new information.
Some of the key processes that operate on this information are attention and classification, rehearsal,
encoding, and retrieval.
Sensory Register
The sensory register is the first memory store of the information processing system.
The sensory register stores information very briefly. If the information does not quickly move on to
short-term memory, then it will be completely lost from the system.
Working Memory, or Short-Term Memory
Working memory, also known as short-term memory is the memory store that holds information and
processes that are currently active.
The size of working memory is extremely limited. It can only hold 7 ± 2 pieces of information.
Chunking is a method to place larger amounts of information into working memory. Another method
is making processes automatic.
The three components of working memory are the phonological loop system, the visuo-spatial
sketchpad, and the central executive.
Perception
Perception is a process that moves information from the sensory register to working memory.
Two subprocesses of perception are classification and attention.
Classification involves both bottom-up and top-down processing.