What is a cognitive tool and how do you use them in schools?

Technology as Cognitive Tools: Learners as Designers
David H. Jonassen
Pennsylvania State University

This short paper is about the application of technologies, primarily computers, as cognitive learning tools rather than as instructional media. I will argue that technologies, from the ecological perspective of Gibson (1979), afford the most meaningful thinking when used as tools... I shall argue that we should take the tools away from the instructional designers and give them to the learners, as tools for knowledge construction rather than media of conveyance and knowledge acquisition. The process of building knowledge bases using these tools (a process that Papert refers to as constructionism) will engage the learners more and result in more meaningful and transferable knowledge in the learners.

Cognitive tools are generalizable computer tools that are intended to engage and facilitate cognitive processing--hence cognitive tools (Kommers, Jonassen, & Mayes, 1992). Cognitive tools are both mental and computational devices that support, guide, and extend the thinking processes of their users (Derry, 1990). They are knowledge construction and facilitation tools that can be applied to a variety of subject matter domains. I argue in the forthcoming book, Mindtools for Schools (Jonnasson, in press) that students cannot use these tools without thinking deeply about the content that they are learning, and second, if they choose to use these tools to help them learn, the tools will facilitate the learning process. Cognitive tools and learning environments that have been adapted or developed to function as intellectual partners with the learner in order to engage and facilitate critical thinking and higher order learning include (but are not necessarily limited to) databases, spreadsheets, semantic networks, expert systems, multimedia/hypermedia construction, computer conferencing, collaborative knowledge construction environments, and to a lesser degree computer programming and microworld learning environments. When students build knowledge bases with databases, expert systems, or semantic networking tools, they must analyze subject domains, develop mental models to represent them, and represent what they understand in terms of those models. It's hard work.

Learning WITH Technology
The primary distinction between traditional learning applications of technologies and their use as cognitive tools is best expressed by Salomon, Perkins, and Globerson (1991) as the effects OF technology versus the effects WITH computer technology. The former refers to the effects of computers on the learner, as if the learner has no input into the process. Learning WITH computers refers to learners entering into intellectual partnerships with the computer. Learning WITH cognitive tools refers to "the mindful engagement of learners in the tasks afforded by these tools and .... the possibility of qualitatively upgrading the performance of the joint system of learner plus technology." In other words, when students work WITH computer technology, instead of being controlled by it, they enhance the capabilities of the computer, and the computer enhances their thinking and learning. The results of an intellectual partnership with the computer is that the whole of learning becomes greater than the sum of its parts.

Reflective Thinking
Norman (1993) distinguishes between two forms of thinking--experiential and reflective. Experiential thinking evolves from one's experiences with the world; it is reflexive and occurs automatically. You experience something in the world and react to it. Reflective thought, on the other hand, requires more careful deliberation. You encounter a situation, think about it, reflect on stored knowledge, make inferences about it, determine implications, and reason about it. Reflective thought is the careful, deliberate kind of thinking that helps us make sense out of what we have experienced and what we know. It usually requires external support, such as books, computers, or other people. Computers support reflective thinking, Norman contends, when they enable users to compose new knowledge by adding new representations, modifying old ones, and comparing the two. Those are the purposes of cognitive tools.

Knowledge Construction, Not Reproduction
Learning theory is in the midst of another revolution (Jonassen, 1991). The new theory that is being used for representing the knowledge construction process is constructivism. How we construct knowledge depends upon what the learner already knows which depends on the kinds of experiences that the learner has had, how the learner has organized those experiences into knowledge structures, and the learner's beliefs that are used to interpret objects and events that s/he encounters in the world. Cognitive tools are tools for helping learners to organize and represent what they know. Constructivists claim that we construct our own reality through interpreting experiences in the world. Reality does not exist completely in the real world. The teacher cannot map his or her interpretation onto the learner, because they do not share a set of common experiences and interpretations. Rather, reality (or at least what we know and understand of reality) resides to some degree in the mind of each knower, who interprets the external world according to his or her own experiences, beliefs, and knowledge. If this were not the case, then every one of our experimental research studies would yield wildly significant differences. This does not mean that learners can only comprehend their own interpretation of reality. Learners are able to comprehend a variety of interpretations, including those delivered by technologies, and to use those in arriving at their own interpretations of the world. But the mind filters input from the world in making its interpretations. We each therefore conceive of the external world somewhat differently, based upon our unique set of experiences with the world and our beliefs about those experiences.
Constructivist models of instruction strive to create environments where learners actively participate in the environment in ways that are intended to help them construct their own knowledge, rather than having the teacher interpret the world and insure that students understand the world as they have told them. In constructivist environments, like cognitive tools, learners are actively engaged in interpreting the external world and reflecting on their interpretations. This is not "active" in the sense that learners actively listen and then mirror the one correct view of reality, but rather "active" in the sense that learners must participate and interact with the surrounding environment in order to create their own view of the subject.