Learning from text: Reflections on the past and suggestions for the future

Abstract

A great deal of progress has been made toward understanding the cognitive processes involved in learning from text. The findings suggest ways to improve learning by enhancing the coherence of texts and the strategies learners use when reading to learn. For the most part, the cognitive research has focused on an individual interacting with a single text, consistent with many traditional educational settings. However, current economic and social trends have revitalized educational reform efforts that emphasize active knowledge construction by the learner and the development of critical thinking, problem solving, and collaborative learning skills. Classrooms organized to support these kinds of learning activities raise a number of new issues for discourse processing research and redirect several current areas of research. A primary goal of this article is to illustrate and discuss these issues.