Agent as Detector: An Ecological Psychology Perspective on Learning by Perceiving-Acting Systems

Many thinkers in the field of learning psychology have contributed to a modern consensus in favor of learning by doing. Of course, Dewey (1963) must be thanked for introducing this idea. But more recently instructional designers have expanded the technology for creating learning environments that foster the design and creation of products in the service of learning abstract content and conceptual information. Vygotsky's (1978) ideas chal­ lenged us to provide scaffolding for relative novices, and Lave's (e.g., Lave & Wenger, 1990) descriptions of situated learning and legitimate peripheral par­ ticipation in communities of learners elaborated the culture in which success­ ful learning can occur. But behind this consensus of the outcomes of instruc­ tional design (ID) lies fundamental differences regarding the underlying psy­ chology.