Educational Psychology: Getting to the Heart of the Matter Through Technology

Les efforts entrepris aux Etats-Unis et dans d'autres pays pour reformer le systeme educatif se perdent dans les sables parce que souvent, pensons-nous, les idees qui sont au coeur de ces reformes ne sont pas correctement appliquees. Les chercheurs ont tendance a surestimer la valeur heuristique de leurs idees. Les recentes percees technologiques offrent une solution a ce probleme remanent. La technologie donne la possibilite de mettre a l'epreuve de facon systematique des dimensions du processus d'apprentissage qui pourraient autrement rester noyees dans un ocean de details, deux exemples frappants etant la maitrise par les eleves des outils symboliques et l'appel au support social. Nous examinons une etude que porte sur l'impact de ces deux variables majeures sur l'apprentissage. On presente aussi des exemples de recherches ou la technologie sert de revelateur en mettant en evidence des modalites d'apprentissage qui sont difficiles a observer dans la classe. Educational reform efforts in the US and other countries come to naught, we argue, because ideas that are at the heart of the reform often are not adequately developed. Researchers tend to overestimate the heuristic value of their ideas. Recent breakthroughs in technology offer a solution to this enduring problem. Technology provides a means of systematically testing aspects of the learning process that otherwise might get lost in a sea of detail, two prominent examples being students' mastery of symbolic tools and their utilisation of social supports. We discuss work that examines how these two key variables affect student subject-matter learning. We also present examples of research where technology serves as an enabler, making more visible certain kinds of learning that are difficult to observe in the classroom. SUMMARY We began this review of promising developments in educational psychology by highlighting a dilemma faced by social constructivists who are playing a leadership role in the current educational reform movement. This dilemma actually dates back to earlier periods of reform, however. It results from the fact that educational reformers often seize on new ideas–in the current case, constructivist views of learning–long before researchers have had the opportunity to work out the concrete details. Dewey and Piaget both experienced considerable chagrin over what many well-meaning educators had done with their complex notions about teaching and learning. There is a danger of that happening once again in the US. The “proceduralisation” of ideas in previous reforms invited an inevitable counter-reaction from educational conservatives, spelling doom for the reform effort. One positive sign that mitigates against the bleak scenario just described, we argue, is the creative way researchers in the US are making use of technology to study complex aspects of the new learning theory. We described three such research programmes: the use of technology to better understand the process of symbolic mediation, the use of technology as a site to examine the process of social support in learning, and the use of technology as an “enabler” to surface certain kinds of complex learning that otherwise would remain hidden–buried beneath the mass of detail that learners would need to master to operate at that level. We hope that our way of presenting these programmes of research will spur interest in the important theoretical and practical work yet to be done.