Design and use of instructional materials for student-centered learning: A case in learning ecological concepts

Efforts to improve students' learning outcomes have suggested the need to embed the use of educational technology in a learner-centered learning environment where students construct their own meanings. In this study, video documentaries that asked students to explore problems associated with farmers' use of ecologically unsound agricultural techniques were developed and used in a student-centered class. Their learning outcomes and experiences were compared to a group of students who studied the same topics in a teacher-centered learning environment. Results showed that the improvement of the student-centered group's understanding of the problems was consistently higher than the teacher-centered group. Data on learning experiences also showed that the learner-centered learning environment tended to engage students in knowledge construction, while the teacher-centered environment, information absorption. Overall findings suggest that technology can change and improve the quality of learning outcomes if designed to support knowledge construction in a learner-centered learning environment.