How Students Learn: Ways of Thinking about 'Good Learning' in HE. EDNER (Formative Evaluation of the Distributed National Electronic Resource) Project. Issues Paper.

This issues paper, one of a series of eight, is intended to distill formative evaluation questions on topics that are central to the development of the higher and further education information environment in the United Kingdom. The topic of this first issues paper is a conceptual framework that can help members of a project (information resource) development team discuss and clarify key issues about how the resource on which they are working is intended to help students learn. This paper offers two aids to thinking about student learning: a set of four images of learning and a set of six characteristics of learning. Of the four images (passive reception, learning as discovery, learning as knowledge deficit and accrual, and learning as guided construction), the last one fits best with current scientific ideas about learning. "Guided construction" gives the learner an active part in learning in a way that resembles the discovery approach while acknowledging the important role of external guidance. Six characteristics of good learning are that learning is: (1) active; (2) cumulative; (3) individual; (4) self-regulated; (5) goal-oriented; and (6) situated (in a social and physical context). Project developers should consider these aspects of learning when planning a resource. (Contains 10 references.) (SLD)