Instructional scaffolding is a method of supporting learning by progressively moving learners towards greater independence and understanding of concepts. Similar to how scaffolding in construction sites allows builders to access new heights, by scaffolding instructional content you can help learners understand and navigate topics and master tasks they might not been able to without the scaffolds.
To create scaffolds, you systematically build on learners’ experience and knowledge as they are learning new skills. Two main types of scaffolding are task scaffolding and content scaffolding:
Task scaffolding: you (the instructor) model steps or procedures involved with a task until the learners can perform the task independently. For example, you can model database searching and then ask learners to conduct a search. You might scaffold the task further by demonstrating searching for individual concepts and then move on to combining searches by using Boolean operators such as “AND”, “OR.”
Content scaffolding: you (the instructor) select content that is familiar to the learners to teach or demonstrate a concept or skill before incrementally moving on to more difficult or perhaps less familiar content. For example, you can model a search in a database/search engine the learners are familiar with (maybe Google or another search) and discuss how the search works before searching in a literature database.
|
