What is meaningful learning?
Merriam and Bierema (2013) mentioned meaningful learning (Ausubel, 1967) as “learning which can connect with concepts already in a person’s cognitive structure” (p. 34). This suggests that a learner is not a blank slate, but a reservoir of learning resources who can integrate or reorganize information according to his/her existing cognitive structure. What interests me is that this idea serves as a ground where I see the connection of neuroscience and social context in the learning process.
How do I experience meaningful learning?
Ausubel’s idea on meaningful learning echoes my personal experiences in both teaching and learning. Connecting new information to my learned information is how I keep on advancing with my learning. At first, it took me four hours to digest an article of a research area I am not yet familiar with. After five or more articles, I readily connect the new and learned concepts facilitating a more meaningful understanding. This indicates that I am continually enhancing my cognitive structure to accommodate relevant information. However, my cognitive structure is not independent from the social context where the learning process occurs. I do not only read but I also socialize to gather information and learn. Having a discussion with practitioners and scholars in a specific field can provide up-to-date practical and theoretical information which I cannot readily gather just by reading alone.
Social and neural connections to meaningful learning
With the advancement of neuroscience, meaningful learning can be further interpreted through the concepts of neuroplasticity and memory. Neuroplasticity, or the ability of the brain to form new neural connections even among adults (Fuchs, & Flügge, 2014), serves as tangible evidence for the concept of cognitive structure. Through training, we are able to connect and learn information and these are represented as functional connections in our brain (Patel, Spreng, & Turner, 2013). Learning music (Miendlarzewska & Trost, 2014) and other forms of arts and learning activities (Sousa, 2006) facilitate connections in the brain and cognitive development in general.
In my experience of learning how to analyze a data set through a new statistical technique, I tap into my existing knowledge about basic statistics to facilitate the transition. This reflects the concept of long term memory – a record of our previous knowledge, skills, and experiences which we can retrieve at a given moment (Cowan, 2008). To make sure that I store what I learn in my long-term memory, I create a strategy wherein I can spend more time learning about it. As soon as I get used to that strategy, there will be less cognitive load making the analysis efficiently doable than usual.
In addition, learning occurs in the social environment wherein I form my network of resources. Social influences have an impact on how we behave and feel even at the level of neural connections (Davidson & McEwen, 2012). In a related concept called communities of practice (Wenger & Snyder, 2000), I can interact with practitioners and scholars of data science to learn more about up-to-date information on data analysis. Aside from a professional organization related to data science, oftentimes this community may be people in the department or organization I am working with. This then reflects the idea of a sense of community at work (Pawar, 2009) wherein learning may be facilitated by equally passionate individuals who view their work as personally meaningful and thus are more willing to help others grow by sharing their expertise. This exemplifies the idea of learning in social context – learning is influenced and motivated by the social environment the learner belongs to (Havighurst, 1965; Vygotsky, 1978). In a related manner, interacting and learning with like-minded individuals can be done online as what is observed in the recent years through massive online courses (Christensen et al., 2014).
Implications to teaching and learning
Meaningful learning is as relevant today as it was conceptualized almost sixty years ago. The abstract idea of integrating information to one’s cognitive structure has now been concretized through neuroscience and elaborated by different contextual factors which include the social environment. This has implications in my teaching philosophy and instructional strategy. In terms of my teaching philosophy, meaningful learning reflects a glimpse of me as a cognitivist facilitator wherein I consider learners as having a network of ideas and experiences that they continually process and make sense of as they learn. Hence, in terms of instructional strategy, I have to make sure that I structure the contents of a learning activity so as it taps on the learner’s cognitive network and provides opportunity to interact with other learners. Such activity may be as simple as asking the learners to reflect on their knowledge and experiences related to a specific lesson and share it to others. They may also create a concept map wherein they visually present the connections of their prior and present knowledge – an innovative strategy which resembles the brain’s neural networks and effectively facilitates learning (Owens & Tanner, 2017).
References
Ausubel, D. P. (1967). A cognitive structure theory of school learning. In L. Siegel (Ed.), Instruction: Some contemporary viewpoints (pp. 207–260). San Francisco: Chandler.
Christensen, G., Steinmetz, A., Alcorn, B., Bennett, A., Woods, D., Emanuel, E. (2013). The MOOC phenomenon: Who takes massive open online courses and why? Retrieved August 10, 2020 from http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2350964
Cowan N. (2008). What are the differences between long-term, short-term, and working memory?. Progress in Brain Research, 169, 323–338. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0079-6123(07)00020-9
Davidson, R. J., & McEwen, B. S. (2012). Social influences on neuroplasticity: stress and interventions to promote well-being. Nature Neuroscience, 15(5), 689–695. https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.3093
Fuchs, E., & Flügge, G. (2014). Adult neuroplasticity: More than 40 years of research. Neural Plasticity, 2014, Article 541870. https://doi.org/10.1155/2014/541870
Havighurst, R. J. (1965). Social factors that influence learning and reading. Literacy Research and Instruction, 5(1), 18-25. https://doi.org/10.1080/19388076509556915
Merriam, S. B., & Bierema, L. L. (2013). Adult learning: Linking theory and practice. John Wiley & Sons.
Miendlarzewska, E. A., & Trost, W. J. (2014). How musical training affects cognitive development: rhythm, reward and other modulating variables. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 7, 279. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2013.00279
Owens, M. T., & Tanner, K. D. (2017). Teaching as Brain Changing: Exploring Connections between Neuroscience and Innovative Teaching. CBE Life Sciences Education, 16(2), fe2. https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.17-01-0005
Patel, R., Spreng, R. N., & Turner, G. R. (2013). Functional brain changes following cognitive and motor skills training: a quantitative meta-analysis. Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair, 27(3), 187-199. https://doi.org/10.1177/1545968312461718
Pawar, B. S. (2009). Individual spirituality, workplace spirituality and work attitudes. Leadership and Organization Development Journal, 30(8), 759–777. https://doi.org/10.1108/01437730911003911
Sousa, D. A. (2006). How the arts develop the young brain. The School Administrator, 63(11), 26-31. Retrieved August 10, 2020 from https://www.aasa.org/SchoolAdministratorArticle.aspx?id=7378
Vygotsky, L.S. (1978) Mind in Society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Wenger, E., & Snyder, W. M. (2000). Communities of practice: The Organizational Frontier. Harvard Business Review, 78(1), 139–145.
Citation: Batara, J. B. (2020, October). Social and neural connections to meaningful learning: Implications to teaching and learning. https://flowjame.com/2020/10/30/meaningful-learning-implications-to-teaching
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