Teaching for Complex Learning & Robust Knowledge

 What Is Robust Knowledge?

Various studies point to three important characteristics of robust knowledge-it is deep, connected, and coherent. Deep knowledge is knowledge about underlying principles that allows experts to recognize the same principle based features in seemingly different problems. 

Teaching for Robust Knowledge

Some strategies incorporated into most teaching approaches are: Practice, Worked Examples, Analogies, & Self Explanation.

Practice: Over learning, practicing even after doing skill or a procedure makes performance smooth, fast, and automatic. Practice can be effective in developing procedural knowledge of how to do things, but not beneficial itself helping students learn analogous things-solve knowledge across. Retrieval practice or testing is better than restudying for remembering information.

Worked Examples: Worked examples can support the development of robust knowledge by managing cognitive load that student’s working memory not overwhelmed. This leaves enough working memory to recognize and remember key features and deeper structures in the problem. The best use of worked examples requires students to explain to themselves why each step in the example is necessary. 

Analogies: To use analogies, students map the similarities or shared features between two examples, cases, problems, time periods, works art, and on. Using analogies can support transfer as students apply what they know to recognize similar processes at work in seemingly different situations. The students are also building robust conceptual knowledge by linking key features in the problems to underlying principles. 

Self-Explanations: To build robust knowledge, the big winner is self-explanation. Explaining each step in a worked example, drawing a model, explaining to a peer, proving evidence, telling why, justifying an answer - these self-explanations are better than detailed explanations by the teacher in building robust knowledge. Self - explanation encourages connections and coherence. 


Submitted By

Dr. Neha Goyal,

Assistant Professor

Jagannath Institute of Education,

JEMTEC, Greater Noida


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