Online resources

PennState University, Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence – An Introduction to Classroom Assessment Techniques [See discussion on background knowledge probes and misconception/preconception checks]


Critical Issue: Building on Prior Knowledge and Meaningful Student Contexts/Cultures


Do You Know Where Your Students Are? Classroom Assessment and Student Learning, 1993, Speaking of Teaching, vol. 4, no.2.


University of Minnesota, Center for Teaching and Learning – What They Don't Know Can Hurt Them: The Role of Prior Knowledge in Learning


PennState University, Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence – Introduction to Planning a Class Session [See: Getting the Big Picture: What Do Your Students Already Know?]

"[L]earners construct meaning out of their prior understanding. Any new learning must, in some fashion, connect with what learners already know … learners construct their sense of the world by applying their old understanding to new experiences and ideas."

Schulman, L. 1999, "Taking learning seriously", Change, vol. 31, no. 4, p. 12, viewed 23 March 2004,
URL: http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/elibrary/docs/taking.htm

"Effective teaching supports positive transfer by actively identifying the relevant knowledge and strengths that students bring to a learning situation and building on them."

Bransford, J., Brown, A. & Cocking, R. 1999, How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School, National Academy Press, Washington, DC, p. 66.

"If I had to reduce all of educational psychology to just one principle, I would say this: the most important single factor influencing learning is what the learner already knows."

Ausubel, D., Novak, J. & Hanesian, H. 1978, Educational Psychology: A Cognitive View, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, p. 163.

 REFERENCES to the learning and teaching literature for this Guideline

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