Module 2 Learner- Centered Psychological Principles (LPC)

Take the Challenge!

In this Module, challenge yourself to attain the following Learning outcomes.

 Explain the 14 principles.

 Advocate the use of the 14 principles in the teaching-learning process

Introduction

You, the learner, are the center of instruction. The world of instruction revolves around you. This
module is focused on the fourteen (14) principles that run through the twenty-five (25) modules of this
book.
Advance Organizer

Cognitive and
Cognitive and Metacognitive
Metacognitive Factor (6 principles)
Factor (6 principles)

14
Learner- Centered
Principles

Developmental and
Social factors
(2 principles) Individual Differences
factors (3 principles)
 Activity

Do this activity before you read about the learner- Centered Psychological Principles.

1. Examine the title, “Learner – Centered psychological principles”.

Quickly jot down at least 10 words that come to your mind.
2. Go back to each world and write phrases about why you think the world can be
associated with LCP.

Analysis
Form groups of three members each. Share your responses. Summarize your group’s responses.

We think that Learner – Centered Psychological Principles focus on

Abstraction/ Generalization

LEARNER-CENTERED PSYCHOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES

The Learner- Centered Psychological Principles were put together by the American Psychologica l
Association. The following 14 psychological principles pertain to the learner and the learning process.
The 14 principles have the following aspects.

 They focus on psychological factors that are primarily internal to and under the control of the
learner rather than conditioned habits or psychological factors. However, the principles also
attempt to acknowledge external environment or contextual factors that are interact with these
internal factors.
 The principles are intended to deal holistically with learner in the context of real-world learning
situation. Thus, they are best understood as an organized set of principles; no principle should
be viewed in isolation.
 The 14 principles are divided into those referring to (1) cognitive and metacognitive, (2)
motivational and affective, (3) developmental and social, and (4) individual differences
factors influencing learners and learning.
 Finally, the principles are intended to apply to all learners- from children, to teachers, to
administrators, to parents, and to community members involved in our system.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

1. Nature of the learning process

The learning of a complex subject matter is most effective when it is an intentional
process of constructing meaning from information and experience.

 There are different types of learning process: for example, habit formation in motor learning
and learning that involves the generation of knowledge or cognitive skills and learning
strategies.
 Learning in schools emphasizes the use of intentional process that students can use to construct
meaning from information, experiences and their own thoughts and beliefs.
 Successful learners are active, goal-directed, self-regulating and assume personal responsibility
for contributing to their own learning.

2. Goals of the learning process

The successful learner, over time and with support and instructional guidance, can
create meaningful, coherent representation of knowledge.

 The strategies nature of learning requires students to be goal-directed.

 To construct useful representations of knowledge and to acquire the thinking and
learning strategies necessary for continued learning success across the life span,
students must generated and pursue personally-relevant goals. Initially, students’ short-
term goals and learning may be sketchy in an area, but over time their understanding
can be refined by filling gaps, resolving inconsistencies and deepening their
understanding of the subject matter so that they can reach longer-term goals.
 Educator can assist learners in creating meaningful learning goals that are consistent
with both personal and educational aspiration and interests.

3. Construction of knowledge
The successful learner can link new information with existing knowledge in
meaningful ways.

 Knowledge widens and deepens as students continue to build links between new
information and experiences and existing knowledge base. The nature of these links can
take a variety of form, such as adding to, modifying, or recognizing existing knowledge
or skills. How these links are made or developed may vary in different subject areas and
among students with varying talents, interests and abilities. However, unless new
knowledge becomes integrated with the learner’s prior knowledge and understanding,
this new knowledge remains isolated, cannot be used most effectively in new tasks, and
does not transfer readily to new situations.
 Educator can assist learners in acquiring and integrating knowledge by a number of
strategies that have been shows to be effective with learners of varying abilities, such as
concept mapping and thematic organization or categorizing.

4. Strategic thinking
 The successful learner can create and use a repertoire of thinking and reasoning
strategies to achieve complex learning goals.

 Successful learners use strategic thinking in their approach to learning reasoning,

problem solving and concept learning.
 They understand and can use a variety of strategies to help them reach learning and
performance goals, and to apply their knowledge in novel situations.
 They also continue to expand their repertoire of strategies by reflecting on the methods
they use to see which work well for them, by receiving guided instruction and feedback,
and by observing or interacting with appropriate models.
 Learning outcomes can be enhanced if educators assist learners in developing, applying
and assessing their strategic learning skills.

5. Thinking about thinking

Higher order strategies for selecting and monitoring mental operations facilitate
creative and critical thinking.

 Successful learners can reflect on how they think and learn, set reasonable learning or
performance goals, select potentially appropriate learning strategies or methods, and
monitor their progress toward these goals.
 In addition, successful learners know what to do if a problem occurs or if they are not
making sufficient or timely progress toward a goal. They can generate alternative
methods to reach their goal (or reassess the appropriateness and utility of the goal).
 Instructional methods that focus on helping learners develop these higher orders
(metacognitive) strategies can enhance student learning and personal responsibility for
learning.

6. Context of Learning
Learning is influenced by environmental factors, including culture, technology and
instructional practice.

 Learning does not occur in a vacuum. Teachers play a major interactive role with both
the learning environment.
 Cultural or group influences on student can impact many educationally relevant
variables, such as motivation, orientation toward learning and ways of thinking.
 Technologies and instructional practices must be appropriate for learners’ level of prior
knowledge, cognitive abilities and their learning and thinking strategies.
 The classroom environment, particularly the degree to which it is nurturing or not, can
also have significant impacts on students learning.

Motivation and affective factors

7. Motivational and Emotional influence on learning
What and how much is learned is influenced by the learner’s motivation. Motivation
to learn, in turn, is influenced by the individual’s emotional states, beliefs, interests and goals,
and habits of thinking.
 The rich internal world of thoughts, beliefs, goals and expectations for success or failure
can enhance or interfere with the learner’s quality of thinking and information
processing.
 Student’s beliefs about themselves as learner and the nature of learning have a marked
influence on motivation. Motivational and emotional factors also influence both the
quality of thinking and information processing as well as an individual’s motivation to
learn.
 Positive emotions, such as curiosity, generally enhance motivation and facilitate learning
and performance. Mild anxiety can also enhance learning and performance by focusing
the learner’s attention on a particular task. However, intense negative emotions(e.g.,
anxiety, panic , range, insecurity) and related thoughts (e.g., worrying about
competence, ruminating about failure, fearing punishment, ridicule, or stigmatizing
labels) generally detract from motivation, interfere with learning, and contribute to low
performance.

8. Intrinsic motivation to learn

The learner’s creativity, higher order thinking, and natural curiosity all contribute to
motivation to learn. Intrinsic motivation is stimulated by task of optimal novelty and difficulty,
relevant to personal interests, and providing for personal choice and control.
 Curiosity, flexible and insightful thinking, and creativity are major indicator of the learn,
which is in large part a function of meeting basic needs to be competent and to exercise
personal control.
 Intrinsic motivation is facilitated on task that learners perceive as interesting and
personally relevant and meaningful, appropriate in complex and difficulty to the
learners’ abilities, and on which they believe they can succeed.
 Intrinsic motivation is also facilitated on tasks that are comparable to real-world
situations and meet needs for choice and control.
 Educators can encourage and support learner’s natural curiosity and motivation to learn
by attending to individual differences in learners’ perceptions of optimal novelty and
difficulty, relevance, and personal choice and control.

9. Effects of motivation on effort

Acquisition of complex knowledge and skills requires extended learner effort and
guided practice without learners’ motivation to learn, the willingness to exert this effort is
unlikely without coercion.
 Effort is other major indicator of motivation to learn. The acquisition of complex
knowledge and skills demand the investment of considerable learner energy and
strategic effort, along with persistence overtime.
  Educator need to be concerned with facilitating motivation by strategies that enhance
learner effort and commitment to learning and to achieving high standards of
comprehension and understanding.
 Effective strategies include purposeful learning and achieving high standards of
comprehension and understanding.
 Effective strategies include purposeful learning activities, guided by practices that
enhance positive and intrinsic motivation to learn, and methods that increase learners’
perception that a task is interesting and personally relevant.

Developmental and Social Factors

10. Developmental influences on learning
As individuals develop, there are different opportunities and constraints for
learning. Learning is most effective wen differential development within and across
physical, intellectual, emotional and social domain is taken into account.

 Individuals learn best when material is appropriate to their developmental level and is
presented in an enjoyable and interesting way.
 Because individual’s development varies across intellectual, social, emotional and
physical domains, achievement in different instructional domains may also vary.
 Overemphasis on one type of developmental readiness- such as reading readiness-may preclude
learners from demonstrating that they are more capable in other areas of performance
 The cognitive, emotional and social development of individual learners and how they interpret
life experience are affected by prior schooling, home culture and community factors.
 Early and continuing parental involvements in schooling and the quality of language interaction
and two-way communications between adults and children can influence these developmental
areas.
 Awareness and understanding of developmental differences among children with and without
emotional, physical or intellectual disabilities can facilitate the creation of optimal learning
contexts.
11. Social influences on learning
Learning is influenced by social interaction, interpersonal relations and
communication with others.
 Learning can be enhanced when the learner has an opportunity to interact and to
collaborate with others on instructional tasks.
 Learning settings that allow for social interaction and that respect diversity encourage
flexible thinking and social competence.
 In interactive and collaborative instructional context, individuals have an opportunity for
perspective taking and reflective thinking that may lead to higher levels of cognitive,
social and moral development, as well as self-esteem.
 Quality personal relationship that provide stability, trust and caring can increase
learners’ sense of belonging, self-respect and self-acceptance, and provide appositive
climate for learning.
  Family influences, positive interpersonal support and instruction in self-motivation
strategies can offset factors that interfere with optimal learning such as negative beliefs
about competence in a particular subject, high levels of test anxiety, negative sex role
expectations, and undue pressure to perform well.
 Positive learning climates can also help to establish the context for healthier levels of
thinking, feeling and behaving. Such contexts help learners feel safe to share ideas,
actively participate in the learning process, and create a learning community.

Individual Differences Factors

12. Individual differences in learning
Learner shave different strategies, approaches and capabilities for learning that are a
function of prior experience and heredity.

 Individuals are born with the develop their own capabilities and talents.
 In addition, through learning and social acculturation, they have acquired their own
preferences for how they like to learn and the pace at which they learn. However, these
preferences are not always useful in helping learners reach their learning goals.
 Educators need to help students examine their learning preferences and expand or
modify them, if necessary.
 The interaction between learner differences and curricular and environmental condition
is another key factor affecting learning outcomes.
 Educators need to be sensitive to individual differences, in general. They also need to
attend to learn perceptions of the degree to which these differences are accepted and
adapted to by varying instructional methods and materials.
13. Learning and diversity
Learning is most effective when differences in learners’ linguistic, cultural and social
backgrounds are taken into account.

 The same basic principles of learning, motivation and effective instruction apply to all
learners. However, language, ethnicity, race, beliefs and socioeconomic status all can
influences learning. Careful attention to these factors in the instructional setting
enhances the possibilities for designing and implementing appropriate learning
environments.
 When learners perceive that their individual differences in abilities, backgrounds,
culture and experiences are valued, respect and accommodated in learning task and
contexts, level of motivation and achievement are enhanced.
14. Standard and assessment
Setting appropriately high and challenging standards and assessing the learner as well
as learning process – including diagnostic process and outcome assessment – are integral
parts of the learning process.

 Assessment provides important information to both the learner and teacher at all stages
of the learning process.
  Effective learning takes place when learners feel challenged to work towards
appropriately high goals; therefore, appraisal of the learner’s cognitive strength and
weaknesses, as well as current knowledge and skills, is important for the selection of
instructional materials of an optimal degree of difficulty.
 On-going assessment of the learner’s understanding of the curricular material can
provide valuable feedback to both learners and teachers about progress toward the
learning goals.
 Standardize assessment of earner progress and outcomes assessment provides one type
of information about achievement levels both within and across individual that can
inform various types of programmatic decision.
 Performance assessments can provide other source of information about the
attainment of learning outcomes.
 Self-assessments of learning progress can also improve students’ self – appraisal skills
and enhance motivation and self-directed learning.

Alexander and Murphy gave a summary of the 14 principles and distilled them
into five areas.
1. The knowledge base. One’s existing knowledge serves as the foundation of all time
learning. The learner’s previous knowledge will influence new learning specifically
on how he represents new information, makes association and filters new
experiences.
2. Strategic processing and control. Learners can develop skills to reflect and regulate
their thoughts and behaviors in order to learn more effectively (metacognition).
3. Motivation and Affect. Factors such as intrinsic motivation (from within), reason for
wanting to learn, personal role in the learning process.
4. Development and Individual Differences. Learning is a unique journey for each
person because each learner has his own unique combination of genetic and
environmental factors that influence him.
5. Situation or context. Learning happens in the context of a society as well as within
an individual.

Synapse Strengtheners

1. Read more on Learnered - Centered Classrooms and make a poster about it.
 Application
The application activity will be done in Module 26 when you revisit the 14 principles. For now, keep the
14 principles in mind as you explore the rest of the modules. Always try to relate the principles to the
concepts you will learn, especially when you do the 5-minute non-stop writing at the end of each
module. Happy learning!

Research Connection
Read a research or study related to learner-Centered psychological Principles (LCP). Fill out the matrix
below.

Problem Research Methodology

Title and Source: (Complete APA bibliographical entry format)

Findings Conclusions/Recommendations