“Scoping the Social Constructivist Ideas: A Social Perspective on Learningâ€

It is evident through the assumptions of Social Constructivism that humans are social learners. They acquire new information when engaged in social interaction with people who are more knowledgeable. In this way, the social interactive parameters are necessary for younger learners to acquire and understand the meanings of the symbol system within their community; thus, enabling them to use it effectively. Based on the assumptions of Social Constructivism to learning, the human being’s cognitive competence relies primarily on taking part in group activities, especially with the more knowledgeable ones. This paper will stress the utility of Social Constructivism and focus on social learning. Accordingly, scoping the Social Constructivist ideas to learning will be through some frames such as Radical Constructivism vs Social Constructivism, schemas as integrated in Piaget’s Theory of Genetic Epistemology, the ZPD’s contribution to learning and the scaffolding’s pedagogical utility paralleled with cognitive apprenticeship. In the same light, the Pedagogical Content Knowledge as a pedagogical frame introduced by (Shulman, 1987) will be highlighted to see its very useful implications to the learning processes.