The Constructivist Teacher: A Mediating Role in Educational Intervention
Chapter 1. The Mediating Role of the Teacher and Educational Intervention
1. Characteristics of a Constructivist Teacher
A constructivist teacher acts as a mediator between knowledge and student learning. They are a reflective practitioner, willing to change, and promote meaningful learning. They provide teaching assistance adjusted to diverse needs, setting goals of student autonomy and self-direction.
2. Teacher Training Plans
Teacher training plans encompass conceptual, thoughtful, and practical aspects.
3. Factors Determining Cognitive Control Strategies
Cognitive control strategies are determined by social influences, the student’s developmental stage, and the specific domain of knowledge involved.
4. Guided Participatory Process
In a guided participatory process, the teacher gradually reduces the scaffolding provided to the student, bridging the gap between existing and new knowledge. This involves providing an overall structure for the activity’s development. It manifests as active intervention from both teacher and student, with the teacher’s role as a guide implicitly and explicitly present.
5. Main Objective of Teacher Training
The primary objective of teacher training is to generate integrated didactic knowledge within the teacher, stemming from everyday problems. From the outset of student challenges, the teacher should be equipped to facilitate their learning.
6. Psycho-Knowledge
Understanding the subject matter requires challenging the teacher’s thinking. This involves using theoretical and practical knowledge, studying how learning occurs, planning lessons, preparing activities, designing support strategies, creating a favorable learning environment, mastering content and assessment skills, and utilizing research and innovation in both discipline and psychology.
7. Tutorial Function
The tutorial function involves the teacher’s intervention to help the student achieve their learning objectives, and vice versa.
8. Adjusting Learning Support
Learning support is adjusted by considering the student’s existing knowledge and, from there, creating challenges that prompt them to question and modify that knowledge.
9. Purpose of Teaching
The purpose of teaching is to enhance student competence and autonomous action. The teacher’s function is to guide and direct student activity.
10. The Teacher’s Role
The teacher promotes learner development and maintains cognitive strategies through interpersonal situations and experiences.
11. Transfer of Responsibility
The transfer of control over learning strategies from teacher to student is influenced by social factors, the student’s developmental stage, and the specific knowledge domain.
12. Zone of Proximal Development
The zone of proximal development is defined by the lower limit of a student’s independent work capacity and the upper limit of what they can achieve with the help of a skilled teacher.
13. Teacher Enablement
A teacher should be enabled in managing learning strategies, instructional and motivational techniques, group management, and related skills.
14. Reflective Practice in Teacher Training
Reflective practice fosters professional autonomy in teachers by encouraging a deep understanding of their teaching context.
15. Examining the Actions of Education Professionals
When examining the actions of education professionals, consider the media, language, and codes used by teachers; assessment systems; general theories applied to relevant phenomena; and the roles teachers adopt to define the instructional environment.
16. Qualities of a Constructivist Teacher
A constructivist teacher is a mediator and reflective practitioner who critically analyzes their own ideas. They promote meaningful learning, provide appropriate educational support, and prioritize student autonomy and self-direction.
17. The Teacher as Mediator
The teacher acts as a mediator to enable students to construct knowledge through their own cultural norms. This involves sharing experiences and knowledge in a process of negotiation and joint knowledge construction.
18. Main Goal of Constructivism
The main goal of constructivism is to describe how humans form knowledge.
19. Qualities of a Good Teacher
A good teacher is an independent, thoughtful professional who embraces their role as an intellectual, capable of forming their own opinions and insights about their educational task.
20. Characteristics of an Expert Teacher
An expert teacher possesses professional knowledge and is dynamic, strategic, self-regulated, and reflective.
21. Key Areas for Reflection on Teaching
Key areas for reflection on teaching include: a) practical and methodological aspects; b) educational aims and content validity; c) school business practices; d) school practices (texts, evaluation, control, administrative intervention); e) general educational policies; and f) general policies and their relationship to education.
22. Reflexive Imitation
Reflexive imitation occurs when, through teacher-student interaction, the student internalizes the teacher’s requirements. Students attempt to construct and verify the meaning of what they observe and hear.
23. Importance of Teacher Training in Constructivism
Constructivist teacher training starts with the teacher’s spontaneous thinking about potential problems and strategies for solving them.