A Field Guide to Constructivism in the College Science Classroom - Four Essential Criteria and a Guide to their Usage

Oct 15, 2026

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This field guide presents four essential criteria for constructivism and explains how educators can use them to recognize and evaluate the degree of constructivism in classroom learning experiences. The criteria cover prior knowledge activation, cognitive dissonance, learning application supported by feedback, and metacognition. Designed for timely classroom use, it supports science educators—especially those in higher education—with practical guidance and best practices for strengthening constructivist teaching approaches.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages5

Reading Time13 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

How to Recognize Constructivist Look-Alikes!

A Field Guide to Constructivism in the College Science Classroom: Four Essential Criteria and a Guide to their Usage R. Todd Hartle1, Sandhya Baviskar2, and Rosemary Smith3* 1Significant Outliers Consulting, Irvine, CA 92606, 2Dept. of Biological Sciences, University of Arkansas-Fort Smith, Fort Smith, AR 72913, 3Dept. of Biological Sciences, Idaho State University, Pocatello, ID 83209 *Corresponding Author: [smitrose@isu.edu](smitrose@isu.edu) Abstract: This field guide provides four essential criteria for constructivism as well as a guide for using these criteria to identify and assess the level of constructivism being used in an educational experience. The criteria include: 1) prior knowledge, 2) cognitive dissonance, 3) application with feedback, and 4) metacognition. This guide provides timely, valuable information and “best practices” for science educators, especially faculty in higher education. Key words: constructivism, prior knowledge, biology teaching, cognitive dissonance, metacognition, science pedagogy. INTRODUCTION Constructivism has become one of the most important learning theories in modern education. It is the basis of inquiry teaching methods, and consequently it is the primary learning theory underlying the AAAS “Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A Call to Action”(AAAS, 2011), the newly released framework for K- 12 science educators (“A Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Cross-cutting Concepts, and Core Ideas”, National Research Council, 2011); and the research and findings that support them. Constructivism is also used as a theoretical framework for many educational research studies in biology (e.g. Anderson, 2002; Banet & Ayuso, 2003; Burrowes, 2003; Donovan, Bransford,& Pellegrino 1999, Eshel, 2007: Herron, 2009; Llewellyn, 2005; Shields, 2006; Yager, 2000) . In our practices, we have encountered numerous people who would benefit from a concise primer on the essential criteria of constructivism, but do not otherwise have a background in educational theory. We have worked with college and university instructors and faculty in biology and other sciences who were trained only in the STEM fields, as well as students, new teaching assistants, pre-service science teachers, and others who are being introduced to (and frequently asked to understand or even use) constructivism or constructivist teaching methods such as inquiry. This article provides an introduction to the vocabulary of constructivism, a concise, easy to understand, distillation of the theory of constructivism, as well as a portable rubric that can be used when trying to identify the constructivist elements of a real-life educational activity. This article thus meets the challenge of a recent Bioscene Perspectives article (Jensen, 2011) that called for enhancing the pedagogical knowledge of college and university biology educators. Just as a mushroom hunter needs to be able to identify mushroom species without becoming a mycologist, a practicing science educator needs to be able to identify and assess constructivism to be able to promote its use. This article, based on the authors’previously published theoretical review article (Baviskar et al., 2009), serves as a field guide for identifying constructivism in the habitat of a college science classroom. So grab your checklist and honeyour powers of observation while we describe the characteristics that will help you identify constructivist teaching strategies. How to Recognize Constructivist Look-Alikes! No field guide for mushroom hunting is complete without comparing edible Morels to deadly False Morels. Likewise, we first need to compare and thereby remove the confusion that arises from similar terms for different theories, specifically: “cognitive” or personal constructivism vs.“social”constructionism. Cognitive constructivism is a theory that describes learning as taking new ideas or experiences and fitting them into a complex syst

FAQs

What four essential criteria of constructivism does the field guide emphasize?

The guide identifies four criteria: prior knowledge, cognitive dissonance, application with feedback, and metacognition.

How does the guide help educators assess the level of constructivism in a learning activity?

It provides a portable rubric-like guide that educators can use to identify and assess the constructivist elements present in real educational activities.

Why does the guide warn about “constructivist look-alikes”?

It explains that confusion can arise from similar-sounding or related ideas that are not the same as constructivism, such as mixing up cognitive constructivism with social constructionism, or equating constructivism with group-work alone.

Oct 15, 2026

Upload by Aldword