We have basically done almost all learning theories, but often we don’t realize that what we are doing actually has a theory. Therefore, let’s try to understand the basics and concepts of learning from Bruner’s theory.
Bruner’s theory itself is a theory that has had quite a big influence on the field of education, especially for learning mathematics. Then, from this theory, his thinking gave rise to discovery learning. So, how did this learning theory succeed in developing one of the newest learning models in this century? What are its contributions to learning in mathematics? Everything will be explained in full below.
Bruner Biography
Jerome Seymour Bruner was born on October 1, 1915 in New York City. Bruner was born blind and couldn’t see until cataract surgery as an infant. He graduated from the Psychology study program at Duke University in 1937. Next, Bruner also succeeded in obtaining a master’s degree in 1939 and also a Ph.D in 1941 at Harvard University.
During World War II, Bruner served under General Eisenhower in the Psychological Warfare division of the Allied European Expeditionary Force. After the war ended, Bruner continued working at Harvard University in 1945. While he was working at Harvard, Brunei began to actively produce various kinds of research on how people think.
At that time, Bruner met with many psychologists at Harvard and many of them adhered to behaviorism which views every behavior carried out by humans as a response to stimuli provided by their environment. Even so, Bruner does not fully agree with this theory. Until finally he and Leopos conducted a series of experiments which resulted in a new theory of perception called New Look.
The New Look reveals that perception is not something that happens immediately, as was assumed in old theory. Vice versa, perception is a form of information processing and interpretation that involves choices. His view was that psychology itself should be concerned with how people see and interpret the world and how they respond to stimuli.
In 1960, Bruner and George Miller founded the cognitive research center at Harvard University. Both of them strongly believed that psychology should be concerned with cognitive processes that differ in form from those of humans and the way these thoughts would be organized into logical syntax. This then gave rise to Bruner’s leading contribution, namely pioneering the flow of cognitive psychology which provided encouragement so that education could pay attention to the importance of developing thinking.
Bruner’s Learning Theory
Bruner provides more views on human cognitive development, how humans learn, or gain knowledge and transform knowledge. The basic premise of this theory views humans as processors, thinkers and also creators of information. According to him, learning is an active process that allows humans to discover various new things outside of the information given to them. Bruner’s theory discusses human learning activities that are not related to age or stage of development.
Bruner’s approach to learning is based on two assumptions, namely the first is that the acquisition of knowledge is an interactive process, and the second assumption is that people construct their knowledge by connecting incoming information with information stored and obtained previously. Bruner explained four educational themes.
The first theme explains the importance of knowledge structures, then the second theme is readiness to learn, and the theme emphasizes the value of intuition in the educational process. The final theme concerns motivation or the desire to learn and the various ways available to teachers to stimulate this motivation.
Discovery Learning
In his theory entitled “Learning Development Theory”, Bruner explains the learning process using mental methods, namely individuals who learn to experience for themselves what they are learning so that the process can be recorded in their minds in their own way. Next, this learning theory was adapted into a discovery learning model which encourages students to learn independently by discovering it themselves.
In discovery learning, students will learn through active involvement with various concepts and principles in solving problems. Then the teacher will encourage students to gain experience by carrying out activities that allow students to discover various principles for themselves. This learning arouses students’ curiosity, motivates students to continue working and also interact with the environment around them until they find answers.
Bruner’s Stages of Learning
The interactions that occur between students and the environment will provide opportunities for them to make discoveries. In connection with this physical experience, according to Bruner, in the learning process, children will go through three stages, including:
1. Active Stage
At this stage, a person will know an aspect of reality without using thoughts or words and consists of presenting past events through motor responses. In this way, a set of activities will be carried out to achieve certain results. In other words, at this stage children will be directly involved in the activity of manipulating or fiddling with objects. For example, if we want to introduce the concept of fractional numbers, we can use an apple divided into two equal sizes.
2. Iconic Stage
In this stage, presentation activities will be carried out based on internal thoughts, where knowledge is presented through a series of pictures or graphs made by the child. This will also be related to the mental image of the objects being manipulated. Children will not directly manipulate objects as students in the enactive stage do.
At this iconic stage, namely a stage of learning knowledge where the knowledge is represented or realized in the form of visual imagery, pictures or diagrams that describe concrete activities or concrete conditions that exist in the enactive stage mentioned above in point a. Language becomes more important here because it acts as a medium for thinking. Then, a person will reach a transition period and use iconic representations which are based on sensing symbolic presentations which are based on abstract thinking.
3. Symbolic Stage
In this stage, language is a symbolic archetype, where children will manipulate symbols or symbols of certain objects. Children are no longer attached to objects as in the previous stages. At this stage, children can use notation without dependence on real objects. At the symbolic stage, learning is represented in the form of abstract symbols, namely arbitrary symbols that are used based on the agreement of people in the field concerned, be they verbal symbols, for example words, letters or sentences, mathematical symbols, or abstract symbols that other.
For example, in studying the addition of two whole numbers, learning will occur optimally if students learn this from the start by using concrete objects, for example combining 3 marbles with 2 marbles and after that counting the number of marbles. These are all enactive stages.
Then, the learning activity continues by using a picture or diagram representing 3 marbles and 2 marbles combined, then counting the total number of marbles, by using the picture or diagram or the second stage, namely iconic. Students can do the addition by using a visual image of the marbles. Then in the next stage, namely the symbolic stage, students can add the two numbers by using number symbols, namely: 3 + 2 = 5.
The steps given by Bruner in learning are logically simple and we can accept them. Where the introduction to learning starts from the simplest or most concrete things, then moves on to abstract things. Maybe we can apply this concept in our daily learning process.