Commentary: Of learning and language and understanding the complexity of the classroom

Abstract

The articles in this special issue reflect an increasing awareness of the complexity and multilayered nature of students' classroom learning experiences. Although the newer social constructivist and sociocultural perspectives challenge traditional concepts of cognition and learning, there is still the need to find ways to identify and evaluate learning independently of describing the processes and contexts of learning. Issues of assessment also are implicated in theories of learning, and there is a parallel need for radical revision of assessment theory. Because the primary medium of classroom experience is language, recent research on language acquisition, and especially the role of genetic structures in determining learning, poses a series of challenges to our understanding of classroom learning. What is needed now is a larger strategic conception of research on classroom learning that attends to the life histories of students, their individual learning trajectories over time and context.