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Have you in your own education, your children’s education, or in a school you’ve taught at experienced a constructivist approach to education? If so, describe some of the impact (positive or negative) you experienced/witnessed.
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Yes I have taught students to use constructivist. After we complete each unit of history, the students are to use their imagination on developing a story, poster, collage or a book presenting some of the topic covered in the unit. Is a positive environment.
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I used it with small group centers, and it works well if you are VERY organized. It is a very tricky thing. You have to have very engaging activities that can be completed independently.
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I’ve used this in Kindergarten with learning centers. It went well with some students and other students had trouble changing to a different center or did not want to do what the center asked for.
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I did take a piece of constructivism when I homeschooled, in that, I allowed my daughter to choose a couple of her novels to read that year. (However, I did choose some of the others that she would read). We were pretty flexible in Science at the elementary level, so I allowed them to choose which projects they wanted to do experiments with. The positive was that they were more interested in those subject areas when they had some choice. I can’t say that I really noticed any negatives, as there was always some structure involved. We stuck to a Traditional/Process Mastery approach, but there were more opportunities for constructivist elements too. I can see where if constructivism is the primary way, where things could definitely become less structured and too egocentric.
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I have used a constructivist approach in teaching high school students. I find it very difficult to make sure students are genuinely learning.