Republic of the Philippines
ISABELA STATE UNIVERSITY
Angadanan Campus
Angadanan, Isabela
MODULE 2
1. Title of the Module: Unit 2: Learner-Centered Psychological Principles/ Cognitive and
Metacognitive Factors
2. Overview/Introduction:
Throughout its history, psychology has provided vital information for the design of
schooling based on theory and research on human learning, development, and motivation.
Research in psychology relevant to education has been particularly informative during the past
decade. Advances in our understanding of thinking, memory, and cognitive and motivational
processes can contribute directly to improvements in teaching, learning, and the whole
enterprise of schooling. At the same time, educators concerned with the growing problems of
school dropout, low levels of academic achievement, and other indicators of school failure are
arguing for more learner-centered models of schooling. Such models attend to the diversity
among students, and use this diversity to enrich learning and to produce results within the
context of current school reform.
3. Learning Outcomes
At the end of the unit, you should be able to:
1. contextualize the 14 Learner- Centered Psychological principles; and
2. advocate the use and significance of the 14 principles in the teaching- learning process.
4. Learning Content
A. The 14 learner-Centered Psychological Principles
B. Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors
5. Teaching and Learning Activities
COGNITIVE AND
METACOGNITIVE FACTORS
LEARNER-CENTERED
MOTIVATION AND PSYCHOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTAL
AFFECTIVE PRINCIPLES FACTORS
FACTORS
INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES
FACTORS
A. The 14 learner-Centered Psychological Principles
The following 14 psychological factors pertain to the learner and the learning process.
They focus on psychological factors that are primarily internal to and under the control of the
learner rather than biological factors. However, the principles also attempt to acknowledge
external environment or contextual factors that interact with these internal factors.
The principles are intended to deal holistically with learners in the context of real-world
learning situations. Thus, they are best understood as an organized set of principles; no
principle should be viewed in isolation. The 14 principles are divided into those referring to
cognitive and metacognitive, motivational and affective, developmental and social, and
individual difference factors influencing learners and learning.
Finally, the principles are intended to apply to all learners-from children, to teachers, to
administrators, to parents, and to community members involved in our educational system.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors
1. Nature of the learning process
The learning of complex subject matter is most effective when it is an intentional process
of constructing meaning from information and experience.;
There are different types of learning processes; for example, habit formation in motor
learning and learning that involves the generation of knowledge or cognitive skills, and learning
strategies. Learning in schools emphasizes the use of intentional processes that students can
use to construct meaning from information, experiences, and their own thoughts and beliefs.
Successful learners are active, goal-directed, self-regulating, and assume personal
responsibility for contributing to their own learning.
2. Goals of the learning process
The successful learner, over time and with support and instructional guidance, can
create meaningful, coherent representations of knowledge.
The strategic nature of learning requires students to be goal directed. To construct
useful representations of knowledge and to acquire the thinking and learning strategies
necessary for continued learning success across the life span, students must generate and
pursue personally relevant goals. Initially, students’ short-term goals and learning may be
sketchy in an area, but over time their understanding can be refined by filling gaps, resolving
inconsistencies, and deepening their understanding of the subject matter so that they can reach
longer-term goals. Educators can assist learners in creating meaningful learning goals that are
consistent with both personal and educational aspirations and interests.
3. Construction of knowledge
The successful learner can link new information with existing knowledge in meaningful
ways.
Knowledge widens and deepens as students continue to build links between new
information and experiences and their existing knowledge base. The nature of these links can
take a variety of forms, such as adding to, modifying, or reorganizing existing knowledge or
skills. How these links are made or develop may vary in different subject areas and among
students with varying talents, interests, and abilities. However, unless new knowledge becomes
integrated with the learner’s prior knowledge and understanding, this new knowledge remains
isolated, cannot be used most effectively in new tasks, and does not transfer readily to new
situations. Educators can assist learners in acquiring and integrating knowledge by a number of
strategies that have been shown to be effective with learners of varying abilities, such as correct
mapping and thematic organization or categorizing.
4. Strategic thinking
The successful learner can create and use a repertoire of thinking and reasoning
strategies to achieve complex learning goals.
Successful learners use strategic thinking in their approach to learning, reasoning,
problem solving, and concept learning. They understand and can use a variety of strategies to
help them reach learning and performance goals, and to apply their knowledge in novel
situations. They also continue to expand their repertoire of strategies by reflecting on the
methods they use to see which work well for them, by receiving guided instruction and
feedback, and by observing or interacting with appropriate models. Learning outcomes can be
enhanced if educators assist learners in developing, applying, and assessing their strategic
learning skills.
5. Thinking about thinking
Higher order strategies for selecting and monitoring mental operations facilitate creative
and critical thinking.
Successful learners can reflect on how they think and learn, set reasonable learning or
performance goals, select potentially appropriate learning strategies or methods, and monitor
their progress toward these goals. In addition, successful learners know what to do if a problem
occurs or if they are not making sufficient or timely progress toward a goal. They can generate
alternative methods to reach their goal (or reassess the appropriateness and utility of the goal).
Instructional methods that focus on helping learners develop this higher order (metacognitive)
strategies can enhance student learning and personal responsibility for learning.
6. Context of learning
Learning is influenced by environmental factors, including culture, technology, and
instructional practices.
Learning does not occur in a vacuum. Teachers play a major interactive role with both
the learner and the learning environment. Cultural or group influences on students can impact
many educationally relevant variables, such as motivation, orientation toward learning, and
ways of thinking. Technologies and instructional practices must be appropriate for learners’ level
of prior knowledge, cognitive abilities, and their learning and thinking strategies. The classroom
environment, particularly the degree to which it is nurturing or not, can also has significant
impacts on student learning.
Motivational and Affective Factors
7. Motivational and emotional influences on learning
What and how much is learned is influenced by the learner’s motivation. Motivation to
learn, in turn, is influenced by the individual’s emotional states, beliefs, interests and goals, and
habits of thinking.
The rich internal world of thoughts, beliefs, goals, and expectations for success or failure
can enhance or interfere with the learner’s quality of thinking and information processing.
Students’ beliefs about themselves as learners and the nature of learning have a marked
influence on motivation. Motivational and emotional factors also influence both the quality of
thinking and information processing as well as an individual’s motivation to learn. Positive
emotions, such as curiosity, generally enhance motivation and facilitate learning and
performance. Mild anxiety can also enhance learning and performance by focusing the learner’s
attention on a particular task. However, intense negative emotions (e.g., anxiety, panic, rage,
insecurity) and relative thoughts (e.g., worrying about competence, ruminating about failure,
fearing punishment, ridicule or stigmatizing labels) generally detract from motivation, interfere
with learning, and contribute to low performance.
8. Intrinsic motivation to learn
The learner’s creativity, higher order thinking, and natural curiosity all contribute to
motivation to learn. Intrinsic motivation is stimulated by tasks of optimal novelty and difficulty
relevant to personal interests, and providing for personal choice of control.
Curiosity, flexible and insightful thinking, and creativity are major indicators of the
learners’ intrinsic motivation to learn, which is in large part a function of meeting basic needs to
be competent and to exercise personal control. Intrinsic motivation is facilitated on tasks that
learners perceive as interesting and personally relevant and meaningful, appropriate in
complexity and difficulty to the learners’ abilities, and on which they believe they can succeed.
Intrinsic motivation is also facilitated on tasks that are comparable to real-world situations and
meet needs for choice and control. Educators can encourage and support learners’ natural
curiosity and motivation to learn by attending to individual differences in learners’ perception of
optimal novelty and difficulty, relevance, and personal choice and control.
9. Effects of motivation and effort
Acquisition of complex knowledge and skills requires extended learner effort and guided
practice.
Without learners’ motivation to learn, the willingness to exert this effort is unlikely without
coercion. Effort is another main indicator of motivation to learn. The acquisition of complex
knowledge and skills demands the investment of considerable learner energy and strategic
effort, along with persistence over time. Educators need to be concerned with facilitating
motivation by strategies that enhance learner effort and commitment to learning and to
achieving high standards of comprehension and understanding. Effective strategies include
purposeful learning activities, guided by practices that enhance positive emotions and intrinsic
motivation to learn, and methods that increase learners’ perceptions that a task is interesting
and personally relevant.
Developmental and Social Factors
10. Developmental influences on learning
As individuals develop, there are different opportunities and constraints for learning.
Learning is most effective when differential development within and across physical, intellectual,
emotional, and social domains is taken into account.
Individuals learn best when material is appropriate to their developmental level and is
presented in an enjoyable and interesting way. Because individual development varies across
intellectual, social, emotional, and physical domains, achievement in different instructional
domains may also vary. Overemphasis on one’s type of developmental readiness–such as
reading readiness, for example–may preclude learners from demonstrating that they are more
capable in other areas of performance. The cognitive, emotional and social development of
individual learners and how they interpret life experiences are affected by prior schooling, home,
culture, and community factors. Early and continuing parental involvement in schooling and the
quality of language interactions and two-way communications between adults and children can
influence these developmental areas. Awareness and understanding of developmental
differences among children with and without emotional, physical, or intellectual disabilities can
facilitate the creation of optimal learning contexts.
11. Social influences on learning
Learning is influenced by social interactions, interpersonal relations, and communication
with others.
Learning can be enhanced when the learner has an opportunity to interact and to
collaborate with others on instructional tasks. Learning settings that allow for social interactions,
and that respect diversity, encourage flexible thinking and social competence. In interactive and
collaborative instructional contexts, individuals have an opportunity for perspective taking and
reflective thinking that may lead to higher levels of cognitive, social, and moral development, as
well as self-esteem. Quality personal relationships that provide stability trust, and caring can
increase learners’ sense of belonging, self-respect and self-acceptance, and provide a positive
climate for learning. Family influences, positive interpersonal support and instruction in self-
motivation strategies can offset factors that interfere with optimal learning such as negative
beliefs about competence in a particular subject, high levels of test anxiety, negative sex role
expectations, and unique pressure to perform well. Positive learning climates can also help to
establish the context for healthier levels of thinking, feeling, and behaving. Such contexts help
learners feel safe to share ideas, actively participate in the learning process, and create a
learning community.
Individual Differences Factors
12. Individual differences in learning
Learners have different strategies, approaches, and capabilities for learning that are a
function of prior experience and heredity.
Individuals are born with and develop their own capabilities and talents. In addition,
through learning and social acculturation, they have acquired their own preferences for how
they like to learn and the pace at which they learn. However, these preferences are not always
useful in helping learners reach their learning goals. Educators need to help students examine
their learning preferences and expand or modify them, if necessary. The interaction between
learner differences and curricular and environmental conditions is another key factor affecting
learning outcomes. Educators need to be sensitive to individual differences, in general. They
also need to attend to learner perceptions of the degree to which these differences are
accredited and adapted to by varying instructional methods and materials.
13. Learning and diversity
Learning is most effective when differences in learners’ linguistic, cultural, and social
backgrounds are taken into account.
The same basic principles of learning, motivation, and effective instruction apply to all
learners. However, language, ethnicity, race, beliefs, and socioeconomic status all can influence
learning. Careful attention to these factors in the instructional setting enhances the possibilities
for designing and implementing appropriate learning environments. When learners perceive that
their individual differences in abilities, backgrounds, cultures, and experiences are valued,
respected, and accommodated in learning tasks and contexts, levels of motivation and
achievement are enhanced.
14. Standards and assessment
Setting appropriately high and challenging standards and assessing the learner as well
as learning progress including diagnostic, process, and outcome assessment are integral parts
of the learning process.
Assessment provides important information to both the learner and teacher at all stages
of the learning process. Effective learning takes place when learners feel challenged to work
towards appropriately high goals. Therefore, appraisal of the learner’s cognitive strengths and
weaknesses, as well as current knowledge and skills, is important for the selection of
instructional materials of an optimal degree of difficulty. On-going assessment of the learner’s
understanding of the curricular material can provide valuable feedback to both learners and
teachers about progress toward the learning goals. Standardized assessment of learner
progress and outcomes assessment provides one type of information about achievement levels
both within and across individuals that can inform various types of programmatic decisions.
Performance assessments can provide other sources of information about the attainment of
learning outcomes. Self-assessments of learning progress can also improve students’ self-
appraisal skills and enhance motivation and self-directed learning.
References
Lucas, M. R. & B. Corpus. (2007). Facilitating Learning A Metacognition Process:
Lorimar Publishing. Retrieved November 17, 2019.
[Link] Retrieved
November 17, 2019.