In this new model of scaffolding the emphasis is not on the product but on
the processes that teachers and learners need to engage in in order to
promote deep learning. Rather than focusing on feedback there needs to be
the provision of feedforward. If learning is about knowledge, skills and
strategies, deep learning is about the internalisation of knowledge,
automatization of skills and strategies, as well as the development of those
beliefs and attitudes that enable learners to develop autonomy. Teachers
need to shift their perspective to that of professional learners and hence
come to see themselves as practitioners who are not merely responsible for
transmitting knowledge and skills but co-constructing meaning in the
learning environment. In this sense, teachers engage in reflective
activities together with their learners, partly by promoting critical
thinking and research engagement.
Mediation plays a major role in this new model of scaffolding. This can
come from outside sources (e.g. subject specific support or general
fostering of strategic competence). However, learners themselves should be
enabled to construct their own scaffolding (e.g. learning in chunks and
mind-mapping). As they work on tasks they are immersed in mediation by
transferring content into understandable and age-adapted forms, thus relying
on peer learning.
In this new model, learning is no longer merely about enabling learners to
acquire content and linguistic knowledge and skills but learning through the
use of a variety of tasks that tap learners’ pluriliteracies, including
digital literacy. Teachers capitalise on inclusive practices so that all
learners’ needs are addressed not only in a group manner but also
individually. Every single learner is given the opportunity to foreground
their specific strengths. This dovetails with the idea that teachers have to
break the mould of conventional tasks (e.g. when asking learners to present
a poster teachers need to reflect on what form of engagement the other
students are involved in). Task outcomes should become new resources for
peer learning. Developing conceptual understanding also depends on the
relations of the learners amongst themselves and between them and the
teacher. Adaptive teaching does not just mean considering the heterogeneity
in a class, but creating a learning rich climate.
Lastly, this new model of scaffolding reconceptualises teacher education
and development by promoting the idea that teachers can perform scaffolding
in class only if they learn how to scaffold learning in their own
professional development. The teacher’s role is reconceived as that of
someone who fosters deep learning together with a group of partners, i.e.
fellow learners. The use of this new model of scaffolding enables the
creation of climates for learning or a supportive environment in which deep
learning can truly flourish.
Daniel Xerri, Malta
Silvia Minardi, Italy
L.K. Sylven, Sweden
Stefan Simovski, Macedonia
Ieva Sproge, Latvia
Daniel Stotz, Switzerland