Topics in Cognitive Science I (2009)

Main point:

Active, constructive and interactive are commonly used terms in the cognitive and learning sciences. But the definitions are not always clear except for constructive. This article provides a framework and proposes a way to differentiate those terms.

From best to worst: Interactive>constructive>active>(passive)

Interactive often describes a system rather than the interactions between a learner and a system. In this article active, constructive and interactive are viewed as types of overt learning activities (from learner’s side).

Taxonomy

Being active is doing something while learning (often involving physical movements). Examples:

• steering and peddling a stationary bike while traveling through virtual environment
• looking and searching some specific locations on a chessboard
• pointing and gesturing at what one is reading or solving
• copying and pasting some parts of a text
• repeating sentences verbatim
• manipulating video tapes (pausing and rewinding etc)
• rotating objects
• selecting from a menu of choices

Note: in memory literature repeating words is a passive learning strategy but in this taxonomy it is active

Being constructive is another set of overt activities that cause learners to produce additional output that can contain new relevant ideas that were not in the initial material. Being constructive includes being active. Examples:

• self-explaining
• drawing a concept map
• taking notes
• asking questions
• posing problems
• comparing cases
• making plans
• integrating text and diagram
• reflecting and monitoring own understanding
• inducing hypotheses
• constructing timelines (history)

Being interactive is having a dialogue with a human or a machine. Not all dialogues are interactive. Dialogues that are interactive:

• instructional dialogues with an expert (teacher)
• joint dialogues with a peer

CLT and this framework are different but can complement each other: CLT can always reduce memory load whether the learning is active, constructive or interactive.