Information Processing II - : Concept Attainment , Advance Organisers,

Memorisation

BOOK NAME
Topic 5
Information Processing II
Concept Attainment ,
Advance Organisers,
Memorisation
1

Information Processing II - : Concept Attainment , Advance Organisers,

Memorisation

Information Processing II - : Concept Attainment , Advance Organisers,

Memorisation
STRUCTURE

CONCEPT ATTAINMENT, ADVANCE ORGANISERS, MEMORISATION

5.1 Overview of concept attainment, advance organisers and memorisation
5.2 Identifying relationships and drawing connections between attributes of concepts
5.3 The meaning of rote learning and memorisation
5.4 Planning lessons with information processing models - concept attainment, advance
organisers, and memorisation
5.5 Implementing activities using information processing models - concept attainment,
advance organisers, and memorisation

Information Processing II - : Concept Attainment , Advance Organisers,

Memorisation

Name of topic

515

TOPIC

LEARNING OUTCOMES

Upon completion of this topic, you should be

able to:
1.Define Concept Attainment
2.Describe Advance Organisers
3.Explain Memorisation
4. Summarise Information Processing
Models - II

INTRODUCTIO N

Knowledge and information are two different sides of a coin. If lessons in the class help
you to be knowledgeable, then the information is everything you receive apart from that.
Knowledge works subjectively, whereas information is objective in nature. Knowledge
gaining is a process that happens after the information is collected, understood,
validated with the real life data in the inductive learning approach. So, let us say that
there are only two aspects to be validated. In the case of any example or any concept, the
data is checked or validated for the number 0 or number 1. If the example is having
matching characteristic with the concept, its 0 and so on. So let us say understanding of
the concept is a business of a binary number.
Concept attainment is a teaching strategy in which the teacher provides students with
positive or negative examples of a concept. Students are supposed to find out similarities
found in each of the positive examples.
Advance organiser is one of the methods which helps students to understand, retain and
remember what was taught in the class especially the new material.
Advance organisers form a link between old and new information, through learning and
activities.
Learnin
g

Advance
Organizer

Fig.

Activitie
s
5

New
Information

5.1

If you are committing your memory to some concept, the process is called memorisation.
The Concept Attainment, Advance Organisers, and Memorisation are crucial
components of teaching and learning.

Overview of concept attainment, advance organisers

5.1

and memorisation
Concept Attainment

Uses structured inquiry process

Based on Jerome Bruners Work

Contrast examples are used and compared with the attributes of a concept

Simply put, it is the identification of attributes of similarities and differences

and generating and testing hypotheses.

Concept attainment is an interesting instructional strategy that is based on Jerome

Bruners Work. It is based on the technique of comparing the concept/object/idea
that contain certain attributes with examples that do not contain those attributes,
categorizing and classifying them based on the understanding of those
object/concept and distinguishing examples of a given group from non-examples.
Here are the four important attributes of concept attainment model
-

Examples
o

Which can be called as instances of the concept

Attributes
o

These are the characteristics that make us place a particular example in a

specific category or class

Attribute value
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o
-

A name
o

Avoiding the non- important attributes or examples that are negative

Which is given to a class or category

Advance Organizers

Forms relationship between what students are about to learn and what they
have already learnt

Advance Organisers prevent overdose of information

Used for

Directing students to the lessons they are going to learn

Stating relationship between ideas that are going to be taught

Reminding students about already acquired information

In Advance Organisers, students learn to relate the new knowledge to old knowledge and
vice versa.
According to Bruce Joyce (2000), there are three phases in Advance Organiser model.
Phase I
-

Make the students understand the purpose or goal of the lesson

Present the advance organizer

Make students aware of the related facts and knowledge

Phase II
-

Present students with the learning material and tasks at hand

Organize the learning material appropriately

Phase III
-

Ask students to summarise, find differences and create examples with organisers

Explain your approach to the subject

It is said that all the ideas should be presented to the students in an organised way and
then elaborated. There should be a link between two consecutive instructional materials

Memorisation

This technique has been in use since time immemorial

Committing your memory to a concept, a thing or an instance is

memorisation

There are some techniques of memorisation that include

Rote Learning

Mnemonic

Mnemonic Link System and so on.

Some of the important principles and techniques of memorisation are

Rote Learning

o It is about not focusing on the understanding but memorising something

by repetition
o Vedic Chanting is a good example of rote learning

o The chants used to be repeated to preserve the accuracy and tone of longer
and texts.

Mnemonic

o Usage of aid for memorizing something

o Can be a list or short verse or poem or special word.
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o They are also said to be constructs of words that are easy to remember.

Mnemonic Link System

o Linking the elements in a string of word.

Peg system
o Through peg system, one can memorize lists

o Peg lists are the word lists that are generated using the numbers they
represent

LOCI System
o Used for list of items that are long and tedious to memorise
o Used to be taught in school in ancient times

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5.2

Identifying relationships and drawing connections

between attributes of concepts

Concepts are related to the attributes; these relationships are used while performing
research and working in behavioural sciences.
Schematic representation of the relationship between concepts, attributes and
variables is as follows.

Concept

Measure
s or
Indicato
rs of
Concept

An Idea or A
general
phenomenon

Variable

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Categories
of a
Variable

Attribute

Let us understand each one of the above schemas separately

Concepts:
Concepts come at the highest levels of generality that can also be defined as
something that needs to be studied. It can also be elaborated as an idea of
any phenomenon.
For example:
-

Getting adjusted to the college environment

Life in the outer social circle

Variables:
Grouping of attributes which is performed logically, variables are the
operational definition of the concept.
So if getting adjusted is a concept,
-

how are you getting adjusted?

how well are you doing your work?

Have you gathered any friends?

The above examples can be called variables. These variables can be

qualitative or numeric.
Attributes:
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When you categorize the variables, you get attributes.

So for a variable of making friends, the attribute of religion can be included.

DID YOU KNOW

Concept signifies word that denotes an attribute
and relation. Word also means an individual,
class or structure.

ACTIVITY

Identify Concepts, Attributes, and Variables

- Working on an
assignment
- Assess how you are
working on the
assignment.
- The assignment is
tough or easy?

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5.3

The Meaning Behind Rote Learning and

Memorisation

Memorization is a simple technique of remembering each concept without

understanding it. This technique does not involve putting forth or explaining
with examples. It has been used in ancient Hindu teaching tradition for
learning Vedic chants. Till now, in India, Vedic chanting is done through
memorisation.
One of the techniques of memorisation is rote learning which the
memorisation of new information is through verbatim. One does not connect
to the earlier learnt information in rote learning.

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The rote method of memorisation is a quick way of saying something that

needs to be reproduced without being read. For example, while acting, the
rote method helps to say lines without actually understanding them in
depth. One good example of memorising by the rote method is learning a
telephone number.
The disadvantage of using Rote Method is that the information cannot be
manipulated or applied to a new situation.
Rote is a form of traditional learning where students learn to memorise,
based on the set of instructions from their teachers. This makes it imperative
for the teacher to transfer meaningful information to the students.
Here, there is an enormous responsibility on the teacher because students
absorb exactly what the teacher says.

5.4

Planning Lessons through Concept Attainment,

Advance Organizer and memorization

Planning Lessons Through

Concept Attainment Model
Concept attainment model is developed by Jerome Bruner, George Austine, and
Jacqueline Jarrett Goodnow It is one of the categories of Information Processing
Model. Concept attainment model is considered to be a teaching strategy.
Here are some of the elements of concepts:
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Name

Attributes

Examples

Attribute Values

Rule

There are three variations of this model

-

Reception Model

Unorganised material model

Selection Model

Concept attainment model is based on some simple fundamentals. Which are

-

Focus

Teaching concepts through specific examples

Principles of reaction

Highlights the reaction of the teacher in relation to the students

response to a situation.

Support System

Concept attainment needs positive and negative examples to be

presented by students

Social System

The teacher assumes as a controller, her work is to record, prompt and

present additional data.

Here is how teachers should plan their lessons using concept attainment
model
Phase I Presentation of data, identification of attributes of concept
-

Through Selection Model

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Teacher presents examples that are unlabelled

Students inquire about the concepts that are the positive ones

A hypothesis is generated and tested by the pupils.

Reception Model

Teacher presents information that is labeled

Students try and compare positive and negative attributes.

A hypothesis is generated and tested by the students.

The concepts are tested and named by students.

Phase II Testing The concept attainment

-

Students find out additional examples

Teacher tests hypothesis and confirms the concept

Phase III Analysis of the thinking strategies

-

Students give the description of thoughts

Advance Organiser
A cognitive instructional strategy that is used to enhance the learning and
retaining of new information.
Here are steps for lesson plans:
-

Presenting the organiser

o One guiding goal to learn something

Practicing the organiser

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o Similar work that gives an idea about the organiser

-

Application of the organiser

o Use the organiser to guide the learning

Integrating and reconciling

o Identification of the connection between new and old content.

Memorizing Model
By incorporating different techniques of memorisation, one can plan the
lessons successfully.

Implementing activities using information

5.5

processing models - concept attainment, advance

organisers and memorisation

Here is how you can implement activities using

Concept Attainment Model
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Some steps are given below to plan the activities

Objectives
o

Define and identify aim and objectives of preparation of lesson plans

Understand which activities will prove effective

Assumptions
o

Based on the area of study identify some assumptions to be worked

on

Hypothesis
o

Teachers have to deduce a hypothesis based on the research

Collection of Data & Interpretation

o

Collection of relevant data and analysis

Interpretation of the analysis

These are the indicative steps that can be used by the teachers to plan activities.
Advance Organizer
One can plan activities using Activity plans, Timeline planner, Task analysis and
Organisers, Concept maps/ Semantic maps, Narrative story, Graphic designers.
Memorisation
Activities can be planned for the memorisation model

CHECK YOUR PROGRESS

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- Explain concept
attainment.
- Define Advance
Organisers
- Define memorisation
- Distinguish the
relationship between rote
model and memorisation.

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SUMMARY

Information processing models have concept attainment,

advance organiser and memorisation as models for teaching and
learning
In this chapter we have tried learning about these in details
Understanding memorisation and rote model along with several
others is an important part of this topic
Planning lessons and activities using concept attainment,
advance organisers and memorisation is also examined in this
topic.

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KEY TERMS
-

Concept Attainment
Advance organizer
Memorisation
Information Processing Models
Rote learning

EXERCISES
SHORT ANSWER QUESTIONS
1. State whose work concept attainment is.
2. Explain what advance organisers mean.
3. Define is rote learning.
LONG ANSWER QUESTIONS
1. Explain about attributes of concept.
2. Explain in detail how memorisation has been used in the ancient world.
3. Illustrate how to plan lessons using concept attainment model.

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