Respecting Cognitivism in Constructivism

After Geoff's lecture on the various theories of teaching I came to a realization about how I came to learn of the world in general.

As a young child, I was under the impression that there was nothing outside my hometown. My family didn't travel much and the only television shows we watched were Star Trek, and Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman. Star Trek was obviously fictitious, even to my young mind, and Dr. Quinn took place in my hometown of Colorado Springs. As a result my belief that Colorado Springs was the entire world was augmented.

Although this concept is obviously false to an outside observer, it was a strict reality to me. When I learned that Joseph Smith went to a grove of trees in New York to pray I immediately assumed it was the grove of trees near my house and that the hill on which that grove stood was called "New York".

When I learned about the Eiffel Tower I refused to believe it existed because I had not seen such a structure in my world of Colorado Springs. To me, Paris had to be fictitious because it did not fit into the parameters of my definition of the world.

As I got older I began to realize that the world was much bigger than I had initially imagined. It soon grew to be the state of Colorado, then to become the Mountain West, the United States and finally the World in general. The World in its entirety existed all along, but in my own mind the world did not exist. One cannot teach or learn about something that does not exist.

My reality of the world was strictly cognitive. There was much wrong with my cognitive, but there was also much right. My view of the world was skewed, but it was accurate to me. If we leave cognitivism alone, it can mislead us. But if we respect the fact that the world is what it is to us at the moment then we can learn and progress and adapt our cognitive process. Since then I have been to the Eiffel Tower, but it had become a reality to me much earlier than I actually experienced it. I had simply learned to see the world on a larger set of terms.

As a teacher, I think it is important to give cognitivism credit where it is due. Whether the student's personal reality matches truth or not, it is still real to them. My job as a teacher is to take advantage of what cognitivism did right for the student and then find ways to build upon it. There is no need to shatter the figurative world they live in, only to give it a different vision to be thought upon. That is when the Eiffel Tower will become real to them, and they will have increased understanding.