UNIT 1 – Learner – Centered Psychological Principles (LCP)

- Maria Rita D. Lucas, PhD

Learning Outcomes:
In this module, challenge yourself to:
 explain the 14 principles;
 advocate for the use of 14 principles in the teaching – learning process;
 identify ways on how to apply the 14 principles in instruction as a future teacher.

Introduction:
The learner is the center of instruction. The world of instruction revolves around
the learner. This module introduces you to the fourteen (14) learner-centered principles
which shall be used throughout this book as a guide in determining appropriate pedagogy
for learners at different life stages.

Advance Organizer

Cognitive and Motivational

Metacognitive and Affective
Factors Factors
(6 principles) (3 principles)
14
Learner –
Centered
Principles
Developmental Individual
and Social Difference
Factors Factors

(2 principles) (3 principles)
Abstraction/Generalization

LEARNER – CENTERED PSYCHOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES

The Learner – Centered Psychological Principles were put together by the American
Psychological 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 physiological factors.
However, the principles also attempt to acknowledge external environment or
contextual factors that interact with these internal factors.
 The principles are intended to deal holistically with learners in the context of real –
world learning situations. 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 factors and affective, (3) developmental and social,
and (4) individual difference factors influencing learners and learning.
 Finally, the principles are intended to apply all the learners – from children, to
teachers, to administrators, to parents, and to community members involved in our
educational system.

Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

1. Nature of the Learning Process

The learning of 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 processes, 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 processes 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 and representations of knowledge.

 The strategic 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 generate 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 long –
term goals.
 Educators can assist learners in creating meaningful learning goals that are
consistent with both personal and educational aspirations 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 their existing knowledge base. The nature of
these links can take a variety of forms such as adding to, modifying or reorganizing
existing knowledge or skills. How these links are made or develop 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.
 Educators can assist learners in acquiring and integrating knowledge by a number
of strategies that have been shown 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 reflecting on the
methods they use to see which work well for them, by receiving guided instruction
and feedback, and 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 order
(metacognitive) strategies can enhance student learning and personal
responsibility for learning.

6. Context of Learning

Learning is influenced by environmental factors, culture, technology, and

instructional practices.

 Learning does not occur in a vacuum. Teachers play a major interactive role with
both the learner and the learning environment.
  Cultural or group influences on students 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 student learning.

Motivational and Affective Factors

7. Motivational and emotional influences 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.
 Students' beliefs about themselves as learners 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, rage, 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 tasks 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 indicators of the
learners' intrinsic motivation to 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 tasks that learners perceive as interesting and
personally relevant and meaningful, appropriate in complexity 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 learners' 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 another major indicator of motivation to learn. The acquisition of complex

knowledge and skills demands the investment of considerable learner energy and
strategic effort, along with persistence over time.
 Educators 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 activities, guided by practices that
enhance positive emotions and intrinsic motivation to learn, and methods that
increase learners’ perceptions 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 when differential development within and
across physical, intellectual, emotional, and social domains 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 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,
for example—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 experiences are affected by prior schooling, home, culture, and
community factors.
 Early and continuing parental involvement in schooling, and the quality of language
interactions 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 interactions, 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 interactions, and that respect diversity,
encourage flexible thinking and social competence.
 In interactive and collaborative instructional contexts, 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 relationships that provide stability, trust, and caring can increase
learners' sense of belonging, self-respect and self-acceptance, and provide a
positive 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 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 of Factors

12. Individual differences in learning

Learners have different strategies, approaches, and capabilities for

learning that are a function of prior experience and heredity.
  Individuals are born with and 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
conditions is another key factor affecting learning outcomes.
 Educators need to be sensitive to individual differences, in general. They also need
to attend to learner 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 influence 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,
cultures, and experiences are respected, and accommodated in learning tasks and
come levels of motivation and achievement are enhanced.

14. Standards and assessment

Setting appropriately high and challenging standards and assessing the

learner as well as learning progress 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 strengths
and weaknesses, as well as current knowledge and skills, is important for the
selection of instructional materials of an optimal degree of difficulty.
 Ongoing 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.
 Standardized assessment of learner progress and outcomes assessment provides
one type of information about achievement levels both within and across
individuals that can inform various types of programmatic decisions.
 Performance assessments can provide other sources 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
future learning. The learner's previous knowledge will influence new learning
specifically on how he represents new information, makes associations 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),

reasons for wanting to learn, personal goals and enjoyment of learning tasks all
have a crucial 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.