Scientific Basis

Meaningful learning

What are we talking about?

Drawing on genetic psychology and socio-interactionist theory, various authors emphasize the importance of mental activity in the process of knowledge acquisition; knowledge is no longer viewed as something external to the individual, who instead becomes the active agent of their own representations. Thus, for learning to be meaningful, it always entails action in response to a given situation, requiring the individual to formulate and test hypotheses based on their own affective, motivational, and relational characteristics. All learning is linked to the possibilities inherent in each developmental stage, to previously systematized knowledge, and to the quality of the individual’s relationship with the knowledge at hand.

Hence the importance of both interactions and learning contexts, where a more experienced partner (whether in an adult-child or adult-adult relationship) creates conditions for their counterpart to test and expand upon hypotheses, establishing connections with prior knowledge. Similarly—albeit without explicit intentionality—child-child interaction also serves as a rich source for revising knowledge and hypotheses. Any experience in which the individual is able to establish legitimate, substantive connections between the content to which they are exposed and the knowledge they have already structured stems from a genuine process of meaning construction (MEC, 1998). In this sense, education plays a role in cultural mediation, relying on intergenerational interaction to make socially constructed and accumulated knowledge available and subject to transformation.

What is the importance of mediation?

Studies focused on early childhood learning generally recognize the child as an active agent in their own learning process. These same studies consider how the child engages with cultural and symbolic objects, as well as the extent to which this learning is linked to the influence of the adults with whom they interact (Teberosky, in press).

Regarding language acquisition and development, for instance—an area where the Education Laboratory focuses its efforts, aiming to create tools and develop methodologies to influence the practices of all those who interact with children—

adult language serves as a model to be imitated, and it is the adults who repeat, rephrase, and expand upon what children say. However, children do not learn merely by listening; they need to participate in communicative situations and have frequent opportunities to use (produce) language. […] This means that it is through the use of language—rather than mere exposure—that children build their repertoires and forms of communication. “[…] To learn a language form or structure, children need a sufficient number of examples to identify regularities and establish the pattern” (Sepúlveda & Teberosky, 2016).

Thus, there is an interdependence between these two agents: on one hand, the child needs the adult as a source for discovering language resources; on the other, the adult needs the child’s responses to adjust these interactions and advance the communicative relationship (Teberosky, in press).

During early childhood, for instance, a child cannot read alone; a mediator helps them construct meaning from the pages of a book: “When properly explored, [books] become a stimulus through which the child has the opportunity to speak and ask questions about the content and form of the text” (Cardoso, 2014). Consequently, parents, grandparents, and early childhood educators are usually the first reading mediators for children; as children draw closer to written language, others also take on this role—teachers, librarians, and booksellers, among others (Reyes, 2014).

Mediation by a more experienced person can provide opportunities for the child—even at a very young age—to discuss the various dimensions presented by a text, whether linguistic, metalinguistic, or content-related. By clearly understanding the “why” and “how” of reading a specific text, it is possible to draw attention to its graphic materiality (punctuation marks, typography, size, etc.), as well as textual choices, characters, the type of narrator, vocabulary, and temporal markers, among other aspects (Cardoso, 2014).

Ultimately, children are constantly learning, and what they observe and experience has the potential to impact their development—whether favorably or not. Therefore, the adult’s role is fundamental, as it is up to them to mediate children’s interactions with the world and to serve as a reference, setting examples through their own attitudes and decisions.

Why language