Schema-based instruction

Chapter 5 shows how schema theory can be practically implemented. It gives a detailed description of one example of schema-based instruction, the Story Problem Solver (SPS). SPS is a computer-based system of instruction constructed around schema theory, using the basis set of schemas developed in chapter 3. It provides fundamental instruction enabling students to build schemas. A second computer program, the Problem Solving Environment (PSE), is also described in chapter 5. PSE provides an exploratory environment in which students can practice and utilize their schema knowledge about story problems. 

Two characteristics of the schema have far-reaching effects on instruction. One is the componential nature of knowledge associated with it, and the other is its network structure. The impact of the four components of schema knowledge is that we may create sequences of instructional material to focus on each of them. The influence of the network structure is that we will tend to make many more explicit connections between topics of instruction than we might otherwise. Schema-based instruction looks very different from instruction based on other principles. 

A point to be highlighted is that students will develop schemas about the subject matter whether instruction takes a schema-based approach or not. Learners will search for structure and relationships. Thus, the questions to be asked about schema-based instruction do not center on whether or not students create schemas. They do. The questions focus instead on the nature of the schemas that are developed. We ask whether the instruction itself can promote more cohesive and better structured schemas than would instruction having another foundation. It is here that the basis set of schemas becomes important, because these lay the groundwork for the instructional design. 

An objective of this chapter, and indeed of much of this book, is to illustrate the importance of linking instructional practice and assessment to a theoretical approach. Schema theory provides a new conceptual foundation for the organization of instruction and the subsequent assessment of students learning from it. In this chapter, I discuss some of the theoretical and practical issues involved in using schema-based instruction. In Chapter 5, I describe a functioning instructional system that is schema driven. 

The goal of schema-based instruction is the creation and expansion of students schemas for the domain in which instruction occurs. To implement this approach, one must first identify the major ideas of a field and the circumstances in which these ideas are manifested, and then one can construct a curriculum that concentrates on learning to recognize these ideas (situations), on... 

It is useful to consider how schema-based instruction differs from other approaches. One important difference is that schema-based instruction de-emphasizes the quantity of factual bits of information that the student acquires. More is not always better. Factual detail is important, but it is incidental in the development of schema knowledge. It will accrue steadily as part of identification and elaboration knowledge, but it is never the central focus of instruction and learning. The focus is on integrating those facts that are essential rather than on acquiring more and more facts. 

A third difference between schema-based instruction and many other approaches is that in schema-based instruction, one wants to introduce the domain to students in a top-down rather than a bottom-up way. It is essential to give them the big picture of the domain so that they can begin to organize their knowledge about it in meaningful chunks. 

Finally, schema-based instruction differs from other instruction in that it targets explicitly the development of links that are central to the basis set of schemas. This aspect of instruction is frequently taken for granted. Schema-based instruction will stress repeatedly how and why different elements of the domain are related. 

Given the schema theory developed in part I, specific questions about how schemas develop may be constructively addressed. One critical issue about schema formation is the determination of specific knowledge that individuals acquire from schema-based instruction. Typically, instruction will offer several different kinds of information, including visual aids, examples, formulas, general principles, and definitions. To study schema creation and development, we will need to know which pieces of information are encoded by students and in what relation. It is particularly import-... 

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