Polangui Community College

Learner-Centered
Psychological Principles
Presented by
Darah San Jose
&
Jefferson San Jose
Learner-Centered Psychological Principles (INTRODUCTION)

• Put together by the American Psychological

Association.

• The 14 psychological principles pertain to learner and

the learning process. These principles have the
following aspects:

a. 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.
Learner-Centered Psychological Principles

b. intended to deal holistically with the learners in the context of

real-world situation.

c. intended to apply to all learners:

i. children
ii. teachers
iii. administrators
iv. parents
v. community

d. The 14 principles are divided into those referring to:

1. cognitive and metacognitive factors
2. motivational and affective factors
3. developmental and social factors
4. individual differences factors
Cognitive and
Metacognitive
Factors
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.)
• different learning process:
ex.
a. habit formation in motor learning
b. learning that involves the generation of knowledge or
cognitive skills and learning strategies
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

• Learning in schools emphasizes the use of intentional

process that students can use to construct meaning
from information, experiences, and heir own thoughts
and beliefs.

• Successful learners are active, goal directed, self

regulating and assume personal responsibility for
contributing to their own learning.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

2. Goals of the learning process

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

• The strategic nature of learning requires students to

be goal directed.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

• 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.

• Educators can assist learners in creating meaningful

learning goals that are consistent with both personal
and educational aspirations and interests.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

3. Construction of Knowledge
(The successful learner can link new information with
existing knowledge in meaningful way.)

• Knowledge widens and deepens as students continue

to build links between new information and experiences
and their existing knowledge base.

• Educators can assist learners in acquiring and

integrating knowledge by a number of strategies that
have been shown to be effective with learners of
variying abilities.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

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.

• understand and can use a variety of strategies to help

them reach learning and performance goals, and to
apply their knowledge in novel situations.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

• 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.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

5. Thinking about thinking

(Higher order strategies for selecting and monitoring
mental operation 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.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

• Successful learners know what to do if a problem

occurs or if they are not making sufficient or timely
progress toward a goal.

• Instructional methods that focus on helping learners

develop these higher order (metacognitive) strategies
can enhance student learning and personal
responsibility for learning.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

6. Context of Learning
(Learning is influenced by environmental factors
including 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.
Cognitive and Metacognitive Factors

• 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
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.
Motivational and Affective Factors

• 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.
Motivational and Affective Factors

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.
Motivational and Affective Factors

• 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.
Motivational and Affective Factors

9. Effects of motivation on effort

(Acquisition of complex knowledge and skills require
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.
Motivational and Affective Factors

• 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 practice that enhance positive
emotions and intrinsic motivation to learn, and methods
that increase learners' perception that a task is
interesting and personally relevant.
 Developmental
and Social Factors
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.)
11.Social influences on learning
(Learning is influenced by social interactions,
interpersonal relations and communication with others.)
 Individual
Differences
Factors
Individual Differences Factors

12.Individual differences on learning

(Learners have different strategies, approaches and
capabilities for learning that are a function of prior
experiences and heredity.)
13.Learning and diversity
(Learning is most effective when differences in learners’
linguistic, cultural and social backgrounds are taken into
account.)
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.)
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 a 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 behavior 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.
 Polangui Community College

Thank
you for
listening <3