Constructing and Transforming Knowledge

When planning a unit of work it is appropriate to use objectives that form both constructing and transforming knowledge. Constructing knowledge is when students learn about concepts, facts or procedures, whilst transforming knowledge is when students apply their constructed knowledge in new situations.

I believe children construct knowledge and acquire skills by actively taking part in the lesson, usually working collaboratively with their peers to solve problems. The students discover learning from their own experiences using concrete materials, and activities, which help to enhance their learning.  (Finger, Russell, Jamieson-Proctor & Russell, 2007). 

Another interesting way is Bloom’s taxonomy. 

Blooms Taxonomy is a framework that I have believed in and used in my teaching pedagogy for effective classrooms. The framework elaborated by Bloom consists of six major categories and each category contains sub categories, all lying in a continuum from simple to complex and concrete to abstract (Armstrong, 2014). According to Forehand (2014), Blooms Taxonomy has also closely linked with multiple intelligence  problem solving skills, creative and critical thinking and more recently, technology integration. This effective framework provides students to think from simple stages linking to high order thinking skills. Find more information

As I understand it both types of knowledge are important but it is our job as teachers to ensure students are developing the ability to transform knowledge as this is what provides them with the skills that are useful across all learning areas and for later life.

I found this website "businessballs"  that explains bloom's taxonomy very useful. Reading from this website and viewing video below, I do believe Bloom’s Taxonomy is a wonderful reference model for all involved in teaching, training, learning, coaching - in the design, delivery and evaluation of these development methods,

Reference

Armstrong. F (2014) the center for teaching, Vanderbilt university. Retrieved from http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/teaching-guides/pedagogical/blooms-taxonomy/

Finger, G., Russell, G., Jamieson-Proctor, R., & Russell, N. (2007) Transforming Learning with ICT making it happen, Pearson, Sydney.