John Godinez EDIT 565 Spring 2008

 Cognitive Load Theory, as defined by Sweller (1988) proposes optimum learning occurs in humans when the load on working memory is kept to a minimum to best facilitate the changes in long term memory

 Cognitive load theory is reconsidered both from the perspective of Vygotski’s concept of the zone of proximal development and from the perspective of research on implicit learning.

 Cognitive load theory argues that many traditional instructional techniques do not adequately take into account the limitations of the human cognitive architecture, as they unnecessarily overload the learner’s working memory, the central “bottleneck” of his/her cognitive system.

 Information falls into two cognitive load categories.  Intrinsic cognitive load  Extraneous cognitive load

 Intrinsic cognitive load is caused by the difficulty level of the content.  It can not be modified by variations in instructional design.  It may be helpful to think of this as the ‘bare minimum’.

 Extraneous cognitive load is a collection of the non-essential elements added to enhance the content.  Caused by the format of instruction  Can be modified by varying the instructional design.

 Learning is facilitated by optimizing, which often times reduces the extraneous cognitive load (Cooper 1998).Cooper 1998  If the combined intrinsic and extraneous cognitive load exceeds the learner’s mental resources, learning will be decreased.  Two key design elements can be implemented to enhance learning: ▪ 1) Decrease extraneous cognitive load 2) Increasing working memory capacity

 Split attention effect occurs when the learner’s attention must be split between multiple sources of visual information that have to be integrated for comprehension, because the individual sources cannot be understood in isolation.  The learner must mentally integrate the information from all sources to fully understand the meaning.  For example, a geometric diagram may be unintelligible for a learner without associated verbal explanations.

 The redundancy effect is a result of integrated information being repeating through multiple media elements.  Peter Doolittle (2001) states that multimedia presentations involving both words and pictures should preset text in written form, or in audio, but not both.(2001)

 Effectively include multiple modalities to increase learning.  Multiple media elements being utilized without repeating necessary information.  Example: Combination of Audio, text, animation used strategically in different ways

 Germane load is the load caused by effortful learning resulting in schema construction and schema automation.  requires working memory capacity  beneficial for learning  it is the cognitive processing in working memory, not the learning as a change in long-term memory that creates (germane) cognitive load.

 Cognitive load theory assumes that the human cognitive architecture consists of multiple memory stores, including a very limited working memory and an extensive long-term memory.  Working memory can combine, contrast or manipulate no more than four information elements at one time (cf. Miller 1956), and without rehearsal, information in working memory is lost within about 20 s (L. Peterson and M. Peterson 1959).

 Working memory limitations disappear when dealing with information from long-term memory, where information is organized into higher order units called cognitive schemata (cf. Ericsson and Kintsch 1995).  Working memory includes different channels for visual and auditory information  Effective memory may be increased by presenting material in an auditory and visual mode rather than in an only visual mode (Mousavi et al. 1995).

 Cognitive load theory assumes that information is organized in long term memory in the form of cognitive schemata.  Schemata are cognitive constructions that help to reduce the cognitive burden on working memory, because they allow categorizing multiple elements of information as a single element.

 o/index.htm o/index.htm  Wolfgang Schnotz & Christian Kürschner. “A Reconsideration of Cognitive Load Theory.” Educ Psychol Rev (2007) 19:469–508