the psychology of learning and motivation - Percepts and Concepts ...

60 John Swellerthan memorizing the answer to 3 4. If so, the task is treated as a lowelement interactivity or ‘‘rote-learned’’ task. Other students may learn that3 4 means 3 lots of 4 or 4 + 4 + 4. These learners are beginning tounderstand the procedure. But note the process of understanding. It relieson long-term memory in exactly the same way as the rote learning with theonly difference being in what is memorized. Rote learning simply meanslearning that 3 4 = 12, while learning with some degree of understandingmeans that in addition to learning that 3 4 = 12, students have alsolearned that 3 4 = 4 + 4 + 4 = 12. Both learning by rote and learningwith understanding require changes to long-term memory with the onlydifference being that learning with understanding requires that more bememorized. If more is memorized, for example, that 3 4=4+4+ 4 = 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 = 12, then even more is understood. Further understandingoccurs when 3 4 = 12 can be related to subtraction, division,and more general mathematical systems. In each case, further understandingconsists of more information stored in long-term memory.Before this high element interactivity information can be stored inlong-term memory in order for the environmental organizing and linkingprinciple to apply, it must of course be processed first in working memory.Processing high element interactivity information in working memoryimposes a high intrinsic cognitive load. Acquiring the informationrequires a greater use of either the randomness as genesis principle ifthe information is discovered by learners or the borrowing and reorganizingprinciple if the information is presented. In either case, the workingmemory load (narrow limits of change principle) is increased compared tonot having to process the additional information, especially if the randomnessas genesis principle must be used. Learners can avoid processingthe additional information by just learning that 3 4 = 12, resulting in ahigh element interactivity task being turned into a low element interactivitytask. Of course, what has been learned has been changed. Changingwhat is learned from high to low element interactivity has the obviousadvantage of reducing intrinsic cognitive load. There are obvious disadvantagesto reducing intrinsic cognitive load when learning by roteinstead of learning with understanding. Nevertheless, some studentsunder some circumstances may have little choice in the matter. Theymay be unable to process the large number of interacting elements thatneed to be processed in order to learn with understanding. The intrinsiccognitive load imposed by learning with understanding may beoverwhelming.3.2. Intrinsic cognitive load effectsCognitive load theory has been used to generate a large number ofinstructional procedures designed to alter cognitive load and, indeed,