Scaffolding your Learning

Construction workers after scaffolding a new building. Sadly there's no budget for the walls.

What's Scaffolding to begin with? An architect would say it is the temporary structure used by construction workers to move around a building that is being repaired or when construction is being built. A teacher would say something else. Instructional Scaffolding (that's the complete term) is the group of instructional strategies implemented to help a learner or a group of learners to reach deeper comprehension so they can grasp successfully the target content intended for them.
Scaffolding is connected to the concept of Constructivism which is about giving the learner knowledge that can be tested and thus is also reliable. Scaffolding is more than anything about training the learner to do his/her own learning. Little by little the learner is left alone so he or she can devise his/her own learning strategies and in the end, becomes an independent learner.
Scaffolding is a fascinating topic and one that deserves more space and further study, especially by those who are just beginning their teaching experience.

Comments

Unknown said…
Dave Criollo
I have heard something about instructional scaffolding in a subject, I don't remember which it was, but I think high schools and college should teach more about instructional scaffolding, it could help so much to us.
July 13, 2021 at 4:15 PM
Mendoza Párraga Martha said…
I had not heard about it before, but I find it a very interesting topic, I think we should learn more about it because it could be useful for us.
July 13, 2021 at 4:35 PM
Katherine Cabezas said…
I agree with this, using scaffolds strategies is great for helping students to understand and interact in the classroom with grade-level content. However, they shouldn't be permanent because students end up coming to rely too much on the scaffolding and not on their own ability. As teachers, we need to observe the difficulties students have in some tasks and then, apply different kinds of scaffolds.
July 15, 2021 at 1:31 PM
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