What is Meaningful Learning?

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What is Meaningful Learning?

The job of an educator is one that is filled with numerous tasks. Many educators enter into the profession expecting to stimulate students minds to process specific pieces of information. However, our job often times range from managing, counseling, disciplining, and in some cases even parenting. Unfortunately, for many teachers and students the learning process becomes entangled among other things deemed more essential to the day to day functions of school. Teachers must incorporate a variety of strategies to encourage classroom interaction that should spark the learning process. The idea of meaningful learning seems to be embedded within the premise of enhancing students learning by giving them the most support as they initially start a task and withdrawal of the support gradually as they advance towards levels of mastery. The ability to provide support when and where it is needed is a powerful tool. Helping students to achieve meaningful learning requires educators to acquire new ways of interacting with students. This interaction should provide an opportunity for students to explore new innovative ways of processing information. Meaningful learning transpires when students build the knowledge and cognitive processes required for successful problem solving. The focus of meaningful learning seems to be consistent with the view of learning as knowledge construction through which students seek to make sense of their experiences. In constructivist learning, students engage in active cognitive processing such as paying attention to relevant incoming information, mentally processing in coming facts into coherent representation, and mentally integrating incoming information with existing knowledge (Mayer, 1999). When meaningful learning is incorporated effectively and students are allowed to tap into experiences or areas unknown resulting in the transformation of classroom instruction.