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The
British
Psychological
British Journal of Educational Psychology (2008), 78, 507526
q 2008 The British Psychological Society
Society

www.bpsjournals.co.uk

Psychological theory and pedagogical

effectiveness: The learning promotion potential
framework

Peter Tomlinson*
School of Education, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

Background. After a century of educational psychology, eminent commentators are

still lamenting problems besetting the appropriate relating of psychological insights to
teaching design, a situation not helped by the persistence of crude assumptions
concerning the nature of pedagogical effectiveness.
Aims. To propose an analytical or meta-theoretical framework based on the concept
of learning promotion potential (LPP) as a basis for understanding the basic relationship
between psychological insights and teaching strategies, and to draw out implications for
psychology-based pedagogical design, development and research.
Method. This is a theoretical and meta-theoretical paper relying mainly on
conceptual analysis, though also calling on psychological theory and research.
Content. Since teaching consists essentially in activity designed to promote learning,
it follows that a teaching strategy has the potential in principle to achieve particular
kinds of learning gains (LPP) to the extent that it embodies or stimulates the relevant
learning processes on the part of learners and enables the teachers functions of on-line
monitoring and assistance for such learning processes. Whether a teaching strategy
actually does realize its LPP by way of achieving its intended learning goals depends also
on the quality of its implementation, in conjunction with other factors in the situated
interaction that teaching always involves. The core role of psychology is to provide well-
grounded indication of the nature of such learning processes and the teaching functions
that support them, rather than to directly generate particular ways of teaching.
A critically eclectic stance towards potential sources of psychological insight is argued
for. Applying this framework, the paper proposes five kinds of issue to be attended
to in the design and evaluation of psychology-based pedagogy. Other work proposing
comparable ideas is briefly reviewed, with particular attention to similarities and a key
difference with the ideas of Oser and Baeriswyl (2001).

After more than a century of endeavour, the relationships and contributions of modern
psychology to practical pedagogy are still the subject of dissatisfaction and critique from

* Correspondence should be addressed to Professor Peter Tomlinson, School of Education, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT,
UK (e-mail: P.D.Tomlinson@education.leeds.ac.uk).

DOI:10.1348/000709908X318672
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508 Peter Tomlinson

eminent commentators. A prime exemplar can be found in the first edition of the
Handbook of Educational Psychology, where Shuell (1996, p. 726) contended that:
: : : most of our knowledge about teaching and learning is fragmented, narrowly focused, and
limited in the psychological understanding it can shed on the important problems of education.
Teaching and learning have typically been studied as separate entities [ : : : ] and complexities of
the teaching-learning exchange have usually been ignored.

Virtually since the advent of modern empirical psychology, educational psychology has
on the one hand been seen, in the tradition of its founding father Edward Thorndike
(1903), as promising a firm scientific base, if not the only proper base (Mayer, 1996), for
the design of effective teaching. From an equally early juncture, nevertheless, problems
even with the conceptualization of such a possibility have been pointed out. From
William James (1899) denying the possibility of psychological science directly
generating schoolroom methods, to the pointing up of contrasts in status between
descriptive theories of learning and prescriptive theories of instruction (cf. Bruner,
1964; Gage, 1964), and beyond (cf. Barrow, 1984; Norwich, 2000), such problems
continue to be cited, with Weinert and De Corte (1996, p. 43) opining that the question
of how science can actually contribute to the solution of real educational problems
continues to be controversial.
As Lowyck and Elen (1996) point out, the above viewpoints tended to be expressed
in the context of meta-theoretical debates in educational psychology, whereas it
should also be recognized that in the post-second World War period a much more
systematic, scientific approach to theory-informed practice emerged as a more or less
coherent movement under the label of Instructional Design (cf. Reigeluth, 1996).
Originally associated strongly with behaviourist psychology, Richey (1986) defines this
uniquely American science as that of creating detailed specifications for the
development, evaluation, and maintenance of situations which facilitate the learning of
both large and small units of subject matter. Although Reigeluth (1996) contends that
instructional design proponents have moved on to utilize the latest non-behaviourist
theories, such as individual constructivism, Lowyck and Elen (1996) charge that
the instructional design approach still does not solve the descriptionprescription
problem and that its behaviourist legacy blurs the distinction between learning and
instruction. In similar vein, whilst welcoming the precision and inclusiveness of the
instructional design approach, in particular the fact that Reigeluth does distinguish
between a theory of instructional design and a theory of learning, Oser and Baeriswyl
(2001, p. 1035) nevertheless point out that an adequate pedagogy has also to show
how these are linked.
The last decade or so has indeed seen increased worldwide attention to pedagogy in
the senses both of teaching activity (Mortimore, 1999) and of understanding teaching
(Leach & Moon, 1999) as a basis for optimizing practice. Nations have focused on the
accountability of their education systems for achieving increasingly specified
knowledge and capability outcomes, moving, as is well instanced in the UK, from an
emphasis on assessment of outcome achievement to pursuing effectiveness of teaching
strategy/process (cf. Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000; Leach & Moon, 1999;
Mortimore, 1999). However, these concerns have too often tended to be framed in
terms of crude searches for silver bullets, whether by way of teaching strategies
that work, constituting good practice, or by way of psychological paradigms that
fully suffice (cf. Tomlinson, 2005). New debates on the nature and possibilities of
evidence-based practice (cf. Thomas & Pring, 2004) nevertheless remind us that useful
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The learning promotion potential framework 509

pedagogical insights need to be accompanied by some reflexive idea or meta-conception

of the nature and power of their effective application.

Overview
In this context, developing ideas originally mooted in Tomlinson (1995), the remainder
of the present paper attempts a meta-theoretical contribution combining attention to
two linked sets of issues whose separate treatment has arguably been part of the
problem, namely: (a) the nature of pedagogical design effectiveness and (b) the
relationship of psychological theory to pedagogical understanding and design.
Starting with (a), I first define the concept of the learning promotion potential
(LPP) of a teaching strategy, based on an analysis of the core nature of teaching and on
basics of the psychology of purposeful action. This LPP concept is then developed to
take account of the complex, situated nature of teaching interactions. Next, I use the
LPP notion as a basis for dealing with issue (b), specifying the nature of the contribution
of psychology to pedagogical understanding and design within what will becomes a
broader LPP framework, that includes an eclectic stance towards potential
psychological resources. This LPP framework is then operationalized into a set of
specific issues requiring consideration in the utilization of psychological theory for
pedagogical design and evaluation. Given the inevitably obvious nature of analytical
insights, I subsequently offer brief discussion of implications of the LPP/critical
eclecticism approach, including contrasting issues for those approaching pedagogy
from psychology and those starting from teaching who might utilize psychology.

The concept of learning promotion potential

The central basis for understanding pedagogical effectiveness must arguably lie in a
valid analysis of the nature of teaching. We start, therefore, from the classic view
(cf. Fenstermacher, 1986; Hirst, 1971) of teaching as deliberately attempting to
promote learning.
Simple and obvious though this formulation may seem, its further examination reveals
a degree of complexity and subtlety within the concept of teaching, whose ignoral has
spawned spurious polarizations and correspondingly sterile debates in education circles.
Most importantly, this conception recognizes that teaching involves an interaction at
least between teacher and learner(s), in the sense that neither can be removed from
consideration, but need treating jointly. Closer scrutiny (cf. Tomlinson, 1985) reveals
that the basic teaching interplay necessarily involves still further, irreducible, interacting
elements including intended learning outcomes, context and resources, as well as
learners, teacher and teaching/learning activity/process the teacher and learner
roles being typically fulfilled by different individuals. This fuller notion of teaching as
a purposeful, situated interaction will be returned to below, but in order to introduce
the LPP concept, it is useful to focus first on the centrality of learning within the
concept of teaching.

Definitional aspect (1): In-principle embodiment of learning functions

At its heart, teaching is a matter of a teacher engaging with one or more learners in
activity intended to result in the learners gaining knowledge, capabilities, or qualities
they did not have at the outset of the activity; that is to bring about their learning. Whilst
the teacher makes an important contribution, as we will consider in more detail below,
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510 Peter Tomlinson

it is the person in the learner role that does the learning. The teacher is by definition
there to assist, but cannot do the learners learning for them. In this respect, it would
be healthy to amend our everyday language tendency to treat teaching and teaching
strategies/methods as what teachers do, and think conversely of teaching strategies as
activities learners engage in with the teacher. Better still, the idea of teaching as
interaction helps us remember that it involves two complimentary sides, either of which
can be focused upon. Thus the same overt teaching activity might be referred to as the
teacher explaining something to the pupils or equally as the pupils listening to the
teachers explanation. The current tendency to talk about teaching/learning activities,
as opposed just to teaching, perhaps indicates a growing if implicit recognition of this
two-sidedness. Nevertheless, as I suggested in the previous paragraph, it is clearly
possible to consider teaching independently of learning, as all too many teachers
appear to do (Calderhead, 1996; Oser & Baeriswyl, 2001).
Thus, placing learning and the learner centre stage, we can say that if the joint
activity or inter-action constituting a teaching strategy is to be successful, it must have a
learning function for the learner. That is, the learners engagement in the activity (in the
above example: listening to the teacher explanation) must somehow embody or
stimulate relevant learning processes within that learner. It may be useful to express this
in terms of the well-known Chomskyan distinction: teaching activities are the surface
structure of teaching, learners learning processes should be their deep structure, whats
going on within them.
By way of an example involving long-established ideas: we might accept the levels of
processing theory of memory (Craik & Lockhart, 1972) or Ausubels comparable ideas on
meaningful verbal learning (Ausubel, Novak, & Hanesian, 1978) as relevant to the robust
acquisition of declarative knowledge. Insofar as we might then be interested in the
teaching of declarative knowledge regarding, say, a particular scientific theory, then other
things equal, deep/meaningful cognitive processing constitutes the requisite learning
function for the acquisition of declarative understanding, and we would want to ask how
far any potential teaching strategies/activities we might consider would be likely to
embody or bring about such processing. In this respect, for example, the teaching/learning
strategy of giving learners a brief verbal input explaining its meaning from various angles
would appear to have some potential for stimulating such processing. Getting them to
engage in an exercise considering its pros and cons against relevant evidence would
probably have still greater potential to engage meaningful learning processes. On the other
hand, just having them rehearse a particular verbal formulation of the theory, with no
explanations, would on its own appear to have little potential to do this.
More generally, we can start to think of the LPP of a teaching strategy or classroom
activity as the extent to which it is in principle likely to bring requisite learning
functions into play and cater adequately for factors that influence them, thereby
resulting in the intended learning gains. We may note briefly at this point that the
likelihood of bringing requisite learning functions into play, as I have just put it, relates
not only to the extent to which the learner activity would be likely to bring about the
required cognitive learning processes, as discussed, but also to how far the envisaged
learning activity has motivational properties affecting the likelihood that learners
actually engage in it.
This and other aspects will be returned to below in relation to other facets of the
teaching interaction. Before that, however, it needs to be pointed out that the LPP of
teaching strategies relates not only to the embodiment of learners learning processes, but
also requires consideration of the pedagogical functions involved in the teachers role.
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The learning promotion potential framework 511

Definitional aspect (2): In-principle enablement of teaching functions

Whether or not one follows Vygotsky (1978) in regarding human learning as inherently
requiring social assistance, assisting learning is how we define teaching. Teaching is the
promotion of learning not only in the sense of involving learners in activities whereby
they are likely to learn, but also in that learners are assisted therein by the teacher.
Accordingly, the LPP of any particular kind of teaching strategy is also going to
depend on the extent to which it allows the key functions of the teachers assisting role
to be realized effectively. At a general level, systems-type analyses and psychological
research on skill (cf. Fischer & Bidell 2006; Gellatly, 1986) indicate that successful
activity requires the integration of two irreducible functions: acting on or influencing
the object/context in question and monitoring the behaviour of that object/context, in
relation to the intended outcome of the activity. In the case of the teachers contribution
to teaching, this translates into two irreducible joint teaching functions, namely:
influencing the learners learning and monitoring the learners learning progress.

Influencing learning
Assisting the learners progress is doubtless the most obvious function of teaching.
Indeed, as contended above, generally speaking teaching has itself traditionally been
taken to refer more or less exclusively to such on-line assistance tending thereby to be
unfortunately identified with what is actually only one possible form of teaching
strategy, the face-to-face transmission of information or teaching as telling. However,
the interplay of this teacher function with the learning function aspect of teaching
implies some quite subtle issues regarding the possible forms and focuses of such
teacher influence, indicating in turn the subtly inferential nature of the LPP concept.
First, we may note that the way this teacher influence on learning is achieved may
vary considerably, from direct to indirect, explicit to implicit, and may be more or less
distinct from the provision of pupil learning function opportunity outlined above.
The possibilities will vary according to the type of teaching strategy involved.
For example, viewed in relation to a relatively active and independent pedagogical
strategy such as learner groups discussing meaningful issues on the basis of
informational resources available to all, it is relatively easy to discern the teaching
influence function as expressing itself in the relatively separate activity of the teacher as
he or she visits and engages with the various groups. Whereas in a transmission version
of teaching as direct, explicit communication typically verbal from teacher to
learner, the learners learning functions are inherently intertwined with the teacher
influence function here the learners learning activity is itself a matter of processing
the teachers input, even if the learning and teaching functions are thereby in some
senses all the more distinct. Clearly, however, the teacher influence function may also be
deployed indirectly and implicitly, if no less powerfully. Indeed, the teachers original
selection and planning of teaching strategy, including relatively active learner methods
such as the above group discussion example, might itself be regarded as an initial,
indirect but radical form of the teaching function of influencing learning.
Also relevant to the teacher assistance function is the issue of its focus, what it
should target. It is important to distinguish the concrete task aim or product of the
activity central to a teaching strategy (e.g. making a model Viking ship, producing
an essay on the Vikings, etc.) from its pedagogical goal(s) of achieving learning
(e.g. gaining knowledge about the Vikings, enhancing skills of reasoning and prose
composition, etc.). It then needs to be emphasized that whilst teachers can only deal
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512 Peter Tomlinson

with learners via their observable actions and communication, the teaching influence
function should be geared basically towards the forms of learning progress that were
intended to be generated by and involved within such activity, rather than just towards
student engagement in and completion of the overt tasks. Even in a teaching/learning
activity deemed high in relevant LPP, its typically multiple layers and the limits of class
management capability will afford many degrees of freedom for learners to engage
differently from the ways intended (including not engaging at all!), so ongoing repair
and assistance for the learning process by the teacher may be needed. This may indeed
be by re-focusing the learner into that pre-specified activity, but if necessary, the teacher
may need to alter the learners activity in order to promote their learning processes and
progress, rather than ensuring simply that they are busy on the planned task.
In sum, then, a further aspect of the LPP of a teaching strategy concerns the extent to
which, beyond tending as such to bring about learning processes through the learners
engagement in the activity concerned, it also enables flexible interaction between
teacher and learners in which the teacher can provide on-line assistance to promote,
supplement, and repair the processes of learning. In order to decide the nature of that
assistance, the teacher also needs to engage in a further function, that of monitoring
learning progress.

Monitoring learning
Insofar as contexts are dynamic and open (Poulton, 1957; Tomlinson, 1995, 1998),
successful skilled action must include reading the situation as a basis for flexible
reaction and anticipation. With its multidimensionality, simultaneity, immediacy, and
unpredictability (Doyle, 1986) teaching easily qualifies in this respect. Monitoring
learners progress, taking account of the nature and achievements of their learning
processes through engagement in relevant activities, is therefore a vital function within
the overall teacher role of assisting learning. In more traditional terminology: along with
the monitoring of learner activity as such, formative assessment of learning progress is
to be seen as an inherent part of the very concept of teaching as a purposeful activity,
rather than as an extra to be added on to teaching conceived concretely just in terms of
what we are calling the influencing learning subfunction. Once again, empirical
research confirms this analytically based claim, as well as usefully investigating the utility
of different forms of monitoring and their formative use to generate adapted assistance
for students (Black & Wiliam, 1998). Though even here there is perhaps the tendency to
see the use of such monitoring too narrowly, for example just in terms of generating
feedback to students (Shepard, 2001).
A further aspect of the LPP of a teaching strategy therefore includes the extent to
which it enables the teacher function of monitoring learners learning progress, as a basis
for flexible adaptation of the teachers influencing learning function. Thus, for example,
whilst they may have some, perhaps even considerable LPP as regards the learning
function facets outlined earlier, non-interactive teaching strategies such as lecturing fall
down particularly by way of preventing the teacher monitoring function, which sooner or
later needs to be implemented through the teacher witnessing individual learners
relevant performances and communication as indicators of learning progress.
To summarize so far: teaching strategies consist of interactive activities involving
learners and teacher that are intended to promote the learners learning. They have the
potential to do so, which we are calling LPP, to the extent that they bring about relevant
kinds of learning processes in learners and afford opportunities for the teacher to
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The learning promotion potential framework 513

monitor and influence such processes. Before extending the LPP concept with respect
to a more adequate view of the further facets involved in teaching, we may note some
corollaries of this idea.

Corollary (1): Differentiation, substitutability, combination and multifunctionality

of teaching strategies
Although pedagogical differentiation is often seen in relation to learner differences,
which will be treated below in the section on situatedness, even in general terms just
of teaching strategies and learning goals, the LPP concept implies differentiation in a
number of other senses, with corresponding implications. Perhaps the most obvious is
that (A) different teaching strategies may have differing degrees of LPP with respect to
the same set of learning goals. To the extent that we analyse different teaching/learning
activities as having different likelihoods of embodying the required underlying learning
processes/functions and enabling the teacher functions of monitoring and assistance,
then other things equal, we should choose those that have the greater LPP (I touch
below on some of the other things that may not be equal).
On the other hand, to return to our Chomskyan metaphor: just as there may be
different ways of communicating the same message effectively, different surface
utterances having the same deep structure, so conversely there may be different ways of
teaching something equally effectively, different teaching strategies that have similar
LPP with regard to the same learning gains. To that extent, such activities would be
substitutable for each other and selection from amongst them would need to be based
on considerations other than the particular learning aspects on which they appear to
have comparable potential. In this respect, amongst others, the LPP notion provides us
with various counters to the sort of pedagogically pathological search for the unique
silver bullet teaching method referred to above.
(B) An equally important kind of differentiation is constituted by the similarly obvious
possibility that the LPP strengths of different teaching strategies may be towards different
kinds of learning goals. To the extent that we have multiple learning goals for our teaching,
we might then wish to combine such teaching strategies. Then again, a particular
teaching/learning activity may indeed be more desirable in both of the above senses: not
just in that it has greater potential to actualize a particular kind of learning, but also because
it has multifunctional LPP, that is capable of promoting a number of kinds of learning
functions at the same time, leading to richer and perhaps more robust learning gains.
To some extent, designing a multifunctional teaching approach may be simply a
matter of combining relatively simple teaching tactics into more complex strategies
within overall teaching sequences: the label teaching strategy has been used above
somewhat loosely to include different scales of activity. Nevertheless, otherwise similar
levels of teaching strategy, for example in terms of the time they take up, may well have
qualitatively and quantitatively different LPP. To take an easy example, compared to
extended rote recitation, well-organized classroom discussion over the same duration
seems considerably more likely to engage the deep/meaningful levels of processing
required by the cognitive theories cited above. At the same time it also provides the
variation and practice in such processing that have been implicated in the consolidation
of constituent processes by a range of psychological sources from early behaviourism,
through cognitive skill theory, to recent connectionist modelling (cf. Tomlinson, 1981,
1999). In addition to such learning functions, classroom discussion affords considerable
opportunity for ongoing teacher monitoring and assistance.
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514 Peter Tomlinson

Corollary (2): The importance of implementation quality at multiple levels

It is important to point out that the LPP concept is deliberately framed in terms of the
in-principle power of a teaching/learning activity both to bring into play those learning
functions in the learner whose operation should achieve actual learning gains and to
enable the linked teaching functions of monitoring and assistance. Whether or not such
a teaching strategy actually does achieve such functions and consequent learning gains
depends, other things equal, on the quality of its implementation. The desirability of
multifunctional and thus probably more complex teaching strategies, for example, may
need to be set against their higher demands in terms of teaching skills and resources.
On occasion, it may actually be deemed preferable to opt for a less ambitious but more
reliably achievable approach in which a teacher has more experience.
Further analysis on the basis of modern fallible realist philosophy of science (House,
1991; Norwich, 2000), backed up by psychological insights into the nature of skilful
action (e.g. Gellatly, 1986), namely indicates that even the most simple human activity is
typified by a multiplicity of strands and levels, with various kinds of subskill capability
and performance embedded within the action as defined, all of whose quality of
implementation has consequences for the overall realization of purpose. With respect to
teaching, this applies to the learning activity as also to the teaching functions. Whilst,
for example, a simple verbal explanation may have potential to promote a learners
meaningful grasp of some topic, in order to actually succeed in doing so, even such a
non-interactive teaching tactic as this must at least be provided in a language the learner
understands, and in turn be spoken with sufficient clarity and at a rate and volume he or
she can perceive effectively, not to mention the learner attending sufficiently and the
teacher simultaneously monitoring whether the learner is doing so. More interactive
and dialogic teaching approaches (Leach & Scott, 2005) obviously pose much more
complex and less predictable implementation demands.
It is thus argued that along with its distinction between overt teaching activity and
underlying learning process, this LPP-derived emphasis on the importance of attending
both to in-principle potential and actual implementation quality provides a preferable
alternative to the simplistic pedagogical determinism that appears to be implied in
characterizing particular teaching strategies as good practice, whether evidence-
based or not.

Definitional aspect (3): The LPP of teaching as situated interaction

So far, the LPP concept has been defined in terms of just two elements in teaching:
particular forms of teaching activity and particular learning processes and outcomes.
We have namely started with the possibility that different teaching strategies may have
differing potential to promote particular kinds of learning process required for
particular kinds of learning outcomes, and that conversely, the same teaching strategy
may have different LPP with regard to different learning goals: an approach strong on
promoting declarative knowledge acquisition, for example, may fall somewhat short for
achieving procedural capability/know-how.
However, the concept of teaching itself implies an interaction of a number of varying
aspect elements, including teachers, learners, intended learning gains, teaching/learning
activities, and contexts, including resources (cf. Tomlinson, 1981, 1985). Putting this in
modern terminology: sooner or later teaching comes down to a situated interaction
involving a particular teacher trying to promote particular learning gains through
particular learning activities by some particular person or persons, in a particular
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The learning promotion potential framework 515

context and utilizing particular resources. Each of these varying aspect-elements of the
teaching situation can make a difference, whether individually or jointly, so that adding
these into consideration, a complexity of possible interactions is generated that may
begin to claim valid reflection of the intricacies of real-life teaching situations.
An obvious first possibility to consider here is the potential interaction between
learner variation and teaching strategy alternatives: even in relation to the same form of
learning goal, different teaching strategies may have differing LPP, be more likely to
work, for different learners. In fact, major strands of modern educational psychology
have targeted the possibilities of differentiation or adaptation of teaching to learner
characteristics of varying sorts (Cronbach & Snow, 1977; Randi & Corno, 2005). Indeed,
consideration of such interaction has been widened to include variation in learning
content as well as learners and teaching strategy, with Shulman (1987) pointing out that
we need not just a generalized pedagogical understanding of how learners learn, but
pedagogical content knowledge: an understanding of what is at stake in the teaching of
different types of subject content to particular types of learners.
Equally, particularly when thinking in terms of planning teaching, it is obvious that
context and resource availability may play a key part in affording and limiting the
possibilities of using particular teaching strategies, let alone influencing their likely
success if feasible. Nor, of course, should we forget the teacher as a further essential
factor in the interaction. Even holding things constant in relation to a particular learning
goal, available resources and learner characteristics, a teacher may be more capable or
comfortable with some teaching strategies than with others.
However, perhaps the most important and practical implication of considering LPP
within a situated approach is that it prompts us to take into account an aspect of
teaching situations long recognized by practitioners as affecting potential teaching
strategies and pedagogical success. Namely, most formal teaching situations involve the
one-teacher-to-many-learners arrangement known as class teaching. Such a recognition
means that whereas I have been tending so far to talk simply of the potential of a
teaching strategy to bring about learning within a learner, realistically we need to
extend this to considering LPP in relation to a class group of learners. That is, we need to
consider the potential of teaching strategies to enable, assist and monitor learning across
the whole set of learners making up the class, in conjunction with other interacting
factors, not least limitations on resources, including time.
Having proposed and somewhat extended the LPP concept as a central basis for
thinking about pedagogical effectiveness, I now want to broaden it into a framework
within which to consider the role of psychological theory in relation to pedagogical
design and evaluation, and thence to operationalize it into an approach that emphasizes
certain options in the usage of such theory.

The broader LPP framework: Psychological theory in pedagogical design

and analysis
The concept of LPP was introduced in the previous section in the context of a
consideration of pedagogical effectiveness, specifically by way of the analytical point
that if by definition teaching aims to bring about learning, then the in-principle
effectiveness of a teaching strategy will depend on the extent to which it enables the
appropriate underlying learning processes, as also their monitoring and assistance.
This might give the impression of LPP being merely an abstract, quasi-quantitative
assessment, a sort of learn-o-meter rating of teaching strategies. This impression would
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516 Peter Tomlinson

be somewhat unfortunate in that whilst this feature may be recognized as one derivative
aspect of the LPP idea, the more central feature on which any such comparative
judgment of strategies might be based is constituted by the nature of the relevant
learning and teaching functions required for promotion of the educational goals in
question. This comes out all the more clearly when we adapt the LPP concept into a
meta-theoretical framework for thinking about the possible contribution of psychology
to pedagogical design, analysis and evaluation.
Rather than thinking simply in terms of associating particular psychological theories
directly with particular overt teaching strategies, I want namely to argue that from the
LPP perspective the obvious and central pedagogical role for psychology is to provide
well-warranted indication of the kinds of underlying processes that overt teaching/learn-
ing activity must somehow embody. As we have seen, these processes involve the
learning functions required for particular kinds of learning gain and the teaching
functions of monitoring and assistance, as well as any factors that may affect any of these
functions, whether directly or indirectly. Awareness of such underlying processes should
be useful in both the design and implementation of pedagogy, and in the analysis
and evaluation of existing teaching strategies. Thus, for example, earlier I cited the
Craik and Lockhart levels of processing theory of memory and Ausubels ideas about
meaningfulness as corroborative bases for specifying particular learning processes
or functions required for robust declarative knowledge acquisition. It would appear
obvious that if we accept these theories and are concerned to design teaching strategy
for such an intended learning outcome, then other things equal we should select
activities likely to embody or stimulate such meaningful/deep processes. As suggested
earlier, there may be a number of different teaching strategies that share the capacity to
do this, though there may also be other plausible candidates that actually fall short.
However, this then prompts the more general issue of how to select from the range
of available psychological paradigms and specific theories. Whilst some eminent authors
(cf. Bransford et al., 2000) suggest that educational psychological sources have been
becoming increasingly relevant to practice in the last few decades, others, as we saw
in this papers introductory section, point to persisting problems. They contend that
far from providing an integrated, universally agreed set of resources, educational
psychology still seems to be characterized by multiplicity, fragmentation, and paradigm
competition. Recent wholesale shifts of favoured paradigm may indeed suggest that in
educational psychology, no less than with pedagogys search for the silver bullet
teaching method, there is an implicit search for the sufficient, exclusive theoretical
perspective, a concern which at the same time generates an emphasis on theory
contrasts and competition rather than commonality or complementarity (cf. Beveridge,
1998; Tomlinson, 2005).

Open-critical eclecticism
I want to argue that we need to confront this persisting state of affairs with an open-
critical eclecticism, by which I mean that we should be open to any and therefore all
offerings of psychological insight, whilst nevertheless applying a triple test of relevance,
coherence and evidential grounding before adopting any of them.
It is surely clear that teaching presents a virtually overwhelming complexity of facets
(cf. Doyle, 1986) that is mirrored by the multiplicity of its psychological aspects the
reason, one presumes, why educational psychology texts are typically so lengthy! Given
this, and without denying the importance of confrontational theory competition in
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The learning promotion potential framework 517

scientific progress, it seems healthy to remember the point made by the psychologist-
philosopher George Kelly (Pope & Keene, 1981) that a theory has a limit in its focus and
that, even if it turns out to illuminate a broader range of phenomena, this range will itself
still be limited. Pending our possible arrival at a fully integrated, coherent understanding of
human psychological functioning, a wide range of differing psychological theories, even
paradigms (cf. Shulman, 1986), may therefore be severally relevant to the many goals and
contexts of teaching. Such insight sources may be complementary and thus potentially
combinable, in that they indeed deal with different issues: sometimes differing issues at
the same level, sometimes perhaps with one theory targeting finer grained processes
within the broader process unit dealt with by another theory. Sometimes the validity of
apparently opposing theories may turn out to depend on further differentiations and
sometimes, even, theories framed in very different terms and based on different
paradigmatic axioms may turn out to have communalities (cf. Beveridge, 1998).
Whilst they also raise some issues to which we will need to return below, the above
points surely oblige the adoption of an open and inclusive stance towards the variety of
educational psychological offerings. That is, in seeking the processes and factors
directly or indirectly basic to aspects of the learning we wish to promote, we should be
actively open to whatever candidates formal psychology offers. However, it may be
argued (Tomlinson & Hodgson, 1992) that before taking on any such candidates, we
should subject them to critical examination on the three aspects mentioned above: their
relevance, their coherence and their formal evidential grounding.
Theoretical coherence is arguably such a basic requisite it needs no further
comment: one can hardly apply what does not make sense. On the other hand,
psychologys empirical orientation is its central strength and evidential grounding in its
own terms is normally desirable as a basis for pedagogical use of any psychological
theory. Though it may be added that if the only available psychological ideas concer-
ning an aspect of pedagogy are hypothetical theorizing as yet lacking evidence, one
might be tempted to try applying them anyway, particularly if they are derived from
ideas that can claim such support.
Using relevance to the learning and teaching functions proposed above as a criterion
might be thought an obviously useful exercise in economy that is likely to make the
consultation and uptake of psychological sources more manageable. Such a view might,
however, need revising on the basis of two further considerations.
Firstly, whilst theories of learning in some sense demand a primacy of consideration
due to the centrality of learning within the concept of teaching, we do also need to
consider the illumination of teaching functions. In principle this means, for example,
that very wide ranging aspects of psychology for example, pretty well anything to do
with communication may turn out to be relevant, all the more so when we extend the
criterion from relatively direct influencing factors to those operating more indirectly.
To cite just one other previous example: the psychology of motivation is arguably
relevant to learning itself both directly (the role of interest and arousal in learning
processes) and indirectly (the generation of cognitively appropriate learner action).
Secondly, extending this line of argument would appear to imply that rather
than simply approaching psychology with a selective list of concerns based on otherwise
non-psychological analysis of teaching activity, pedagogues should be open to psycho-
logy in the more basic sense of becoming systematically aware in the first place of its broad
range of offerings. How such awareness may be brought into pedagogical design is
nevertheless something we will turn to below, since this is an appropriate point at
which to briefly situate the present ideas against other comparable contributions.
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518 Peter Tomlinson

Communality and contrast with other work

There is not space here to do justice to other sources of ideas comparable to those
developed in this paper. Passing acknowledgement should nevertheless be made at least of
William Jamess (1899) view of the indirectness of psychologys contribution and his
version of substitutability, that many diverse methods of teaching are likely to be consistent
with a given law of learning. Also, more recently, Shuell suggested much the same concept
of learning functions as proposed here, namely : : : psychological processes that current
psychological theory and research indicate need to be elicited in students if the teaching-
learning process is to be successful (Shuell, 1996, p. 751), adding that these might
be initiated either by the teacher or the students. Rosenshine (cf. Rosenshine & Stevens,
1986) has proposed major teaching functions, based on findings from process-product
studies and addressing teachers separately from learners. As Shuell (1996) points out, the
two kinds of functions are in fact complementary, and as he and later Oser and Baeriswyl
(2001) insist, an adequate pedagogy requires an understanding of their relationships.
However, it is arguably the work of the last two authors that merits specific comment,
given its strong commonality yet also a clear contrast with the present proposals. By way
of communality, central to Oser and Baeriswyls (2001) Choreographies of Teaching
approach is their distinction between the visible or sight-structure of teaching activities
and the inner learning processes or mental operations of the learner which they
contend must be brought about for the teaching to succeed. They refer to these inner
processes as basis-models and illustrate in concrete detail how the same underlying
learning process might be achieved through different, in our terms substitutable, forms
of visible teaching strategy.
Whilst the parallels with the present ideas seem very clear, Oser and Baeriswyls
terminology of basis models also begins to signal an aspect that contrasts with the open-
critical eclecticism proposed here. Namely, they additionally claim the existence of a
definitive set, 12 in number, of such underlying patterns of learning operations. These
they describe as concatenations of operations or operation groups that are somehow
necessary for every learner and that cannot be replaced by anything else (Oser &
Baeriswyl, 2001, p. 1043). In their view, each basis model is a learning script involving
not only particular kinds of learning process events, but also the chaining of these in a
particular order of absolutely necessary steps (p. 1045).
Although the critically eclectic stance enjoined here would not in principle rule out
the possibility of a limited number of core psycho-pedagogical deep structures, Oser and
Baeriswyls considerable claim appears to be that their 12 basis models cover all the
forms of learning with which teaching might be concerned. In the present writers
view, accepting this is a step too far at this juncture. Given limitations on space, two
illustrative objections may suffice.
Firstly, these authors do not appear to have a model covering an arguably key kind of
learning, the acquisition of intelligent procedural capability, traditionally referred to as
skill (cf. Gellatly, 1986; Welford, 1968) and currently as expertise (Ericsson, Charness,
Feltovich, & Hoffman, 2006; Tomlinson, 2005). They do use the term skill, but appear
to conceive of it rather narrowly, merely as a matter of habit, as also signalled by the label
for their relevant basis model development of routines and skills. This conception of
skill contrasts rather with the purposeful, problem solving-like kind of procedural
capability (including automatization) assumed by the standard literature (e.g. Anderson,
2000; Fischer & Bidell, 2006; Gellatly, 1986; Hargie, 1986; Tomlinson, 1998). It may be
mentioned that Tomlinson (1995, Chapter 5) did attempt to specify the basic learning
functions requisite for the acquisition of skill thus conceived.
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The learning promotion potential framework 519

A second and still more specific illustration is that Oser and Baeriswyl propose
hypertext learning as one of their core underlying forms of learning, whose associated
learning goal is described as re-ordering and revaluing of information bits. The present
writer would object firstly that hypertext should be seen as a topic, context, or tool for
learning, rather than a basic form of learning process in itself all the more so when
hypertext is such a recently invented medium, whereas basic human learning processes
must presumably have been generated over the course of an evolutionary period that
considerably predated the existence of this medium. It could be added that even in the
terms in which Oser and Baeriswyl construe hypertext learning, it is hard to see why it
does not count either as a form of problem-solving or skill acquisition until one sees
that as well as their conception of skill, their idea of problem-solving also appears
somewhat inadequate, being formulated by them as having the goal (sic) of trial and
error learning (of Oser & Baeriswyl, 2001, p. 1046).
Thus, whilst it seems important to acknowledge core features of the LPP and
choreographies of teaching frameworks as strongly overlapping and mutually
supportive, the claimed completeness of Oser and Baeriswyls set of basic learning
models is to be rejected in favour of the more modest open-critical eclecticism I have
argued for regarding currently available psychological resources.

Operationalizing the LPP/critical eclecticism approach to pedagogical design

and analysis
Having developed the constituent principles of a meta-theoretical framework for
utilizing psychology in the service of pedagogical effectiveness, it behoves me to specify
what is concretely involved in the practical use of such a framework. Five major kinds of
issue appear to require treating by way of applying the LPP/critical eclecticism approach
to practical pedagogy. Whilst the order in which these are now presented may be most
appropriate for explicit use of psychological theory in pedagogical design, it bears
emphasizing that this is but one of many possible orders of consideration.

(1) Formulation of intended learning/teaching outcomes: I take it as axiomatic that

teaching, certainly in formal education systems, involves adopting some kind of
explicit goal involving learning gains. It is recognized that human qualities and
powers are such that they can pose considerable difficulties of articulation and
assessment and that teachers share the tendency of all experienced practitioners to
become increasingly intuitive in their regulation of skilful action. Nevertheless, to
consider teaching explicitly but without reference to its goals would indeed be a
case of Hamlet without the Dane. A central and typically early element in practical
usage of the LPP/critical eclecticism framework, whether it is a question of
designing the teaching or of evaluating an existing teaching plan, therefore consists
in explicit framing of the intended learning outcomes of the teaching in question.
(2) Selection of useful psychological theories: At some point one needs to select
appropriate psychological theories, in the first place on the basis of relevance to the
chosen teaching/learning goals, but also to the particular learners, the available
resources and particular teachers involved, and having appropriate evidential
grounding. That is, one needs to apply critical and realistic eclecticism to available
psychological sources.
(3) Establishment of learning functions/process requirements: Having selected such
theoretical resources, one needs to discern the key psychological learning/teaching
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520 Peter Tomlinson

functions or processes, including indirect psychological prerequisites, indicated by

them in the light of their evidence base.
(4) Design/analysis of teaching activities for LPP against learning functions: At its
core, proactive use of the approach in designing teaching requires (a)
generation/selection of teaching/learning strategies and substrategies, that (b) do
embody in the learner the relevant learning functions and psychological process
prerequisites discerned from utilized theory, and (c) enable corresponding
psychological functionality with respect to the teachers two major teaching
functions, on-line monitoring and assistance. In the case of psychology-based
evaluation of existing teaching designs, the teaching strategies are already given,
leaving just the issue of carrying out an LPP analysis against a similarly open-
critically selection of theories and their psychological process requisites.
(5) Attention to implementation quality of actual teaching: Using an LPP approach,
the evaluation of teaching strategies, including any attempt to go beyond theory-
based design and test ones ideas, needs to consider not only actual achievement of
intended learning gains, but also the quality with which the planned teaching is
implemented in practice, including aspects of process, learner access and resource
availability. The potential of a strategy, and still less the theorizing supporting it, is
not being assessed when a strategy is inadequately implemented. In fact, insofar as
we wish to test the educational utility of psychological theories, all five steps require
fulfilment, sooner or later including a reflexive check on the adequacy with which
the above aspect-phases (1)(4) of psycho-pedagogical planning have been
achieved. To the extent that the implementation of any these planning steps fall
short, any failings in effectiveness of the teaching cannot safely be attributed to any
of the previous aspect-phases. In due course, moreover, we should be interested in
tracing the specific linkage of particular process aspects with the learning progress
and outcomes for which they were deemed to have LPP. Such work would doubtless
require the integration of a variety of specific research methodologies, consistent
with recent proposals regarding intervention and design study approaches (Gorard
& Taylor, 2004; Pressley, Graham, & Harris, 2006).

Whilst the above five working steps are proposed as the essentials of a full application of
the LPP/critical eclecticism approach, a range of useful possibilities may exist with
respect to their combination, ordering and even selection. Thus as a first instance,
although it was suggested that the above order might be appropriate in pedagogical
design, such a process is in reality likely to be considerably more messy and iterative. This
could well include repeated cycles connecting (1) intended outcome specifications, (2)
selection of particular psychological theories, (3) establishment of learning function-
s/process requirements, and (4) generation of teaching strategies, with the relative
starting-points differing according to where the designer is coming from. Someone
familiar with a range of teaching approaches in the subject, but relatively unfamiliar with
psychological work, for instance, would be facing somewhat different subissues
compared with someone who has a wide psychological familiarity, particularly if they
have already translated this into awareness of a range of core psychological requisites
requiring embodiment within learning and teaching functions.
A contrasting possibility is that where it is more a matter of pedagogical
evaluation and analysis, one is by definition starting from (1) intended learning
outcomes, and (4a) proposed or actual teaching strategies, which one then needs to
subject to (4b), an LPP analysis with reference to (3), the learning functions one
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The learning promotion potential framework 521

drew from (2), available psychological resources. Here too different suborders and
emphases are possible.

Postscript
The idea of LPP has been proposed here as the basis for a conceptual framework and
corresponding terminology for specifying the locus of psychologys contribution to the
optimizing of pedagogy, in a way that takes us beyond some of the oversimplifications
and fragmentations of the past. I would claim that this framework, along with the open-
critical eclecticism towards psychological resources I have argued for, provides a more
qualified, but thereby ultimately more robust vindication of the utility of formal
psychology in the service of effective pedagogy. The price of such claimed progress is
admittedly the requirement to handle a new and in some ways more complex
perspective pointing up challenges, some of which it has not been possible to discuss
here. These might include for example the possibility of negative LPP, that is particular
teaching strategies doing more harm than good, or that of multiple aims in teaching
that may turn out to be psychologically antagonistic. However, the case for the utility of
this LPP approach may need some differentiation with respect to the two main groups
likely to be involved: on the one hand, non-psychologist teachers and subject-specialist
designers of teaching who might consider calling on psychology, and, on the other,
psychologists concerned to apply their ideas pedagogically.

From pedagogy to psychology

What if anything does the LPP approach enable us to say in favour of psychology
to non-psychologist educators, including the many teachers who appear (Brown &
McIntyre, 1993; Calderhead, 1996; Oser & Baeriswyl, 2001) to consider teaching without
reference to learning (or its equivalent), let alone to psychology?
It should firstly be recognized that the LPP framework, as well as certain modern
psychological insights, would actually tend to undermine any claim that formal
psychological insights necessarily lead to better teaching. In principle, a teacher might
learn to adapt their teaching strategies on the basis of professional experience, and if
Ryle (1949) and modern work on implicit learning are accepted (Tomlinson, 1999), we
must even entertain the possibility that they might thereby successfully promote
learning without conscious-declarative understanding, let alone of formal psychological
insights. Teaching designed with the assistance of formal psychology cannot for this
reason be guaranteed superior in principle to teaching not so informed, and the LPP
framework would of course also point out that actual success in practice would depend
further upon various aspects of implementation quality.
But the LPP approach does permit us at least two arguments for the utility of
psychological insights. The first follows directly from the nature of the pedagogical
functions described in this paper: teaching activities have to embody learning
processes and the teachers key function is to combine monitoring of and assistance
for students learning rather than simply their task completion. Designing activity for
learning and any sort of adjustment to the planned teaching interaction arguably both
require conscious problem-solving involving explicit thinking about learning. Such
thinking ought to be well grounded, which means, other things equal, that it ought
at least to take account of formal research on learning and its educational application.
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522 Peter Tomlinson

In other words, in the light of the LPP/open-critical eclecticism approach presented

here, teacher thinking should take account of educational psychology to illuminate the
key underlying processes we have termed learning and teaching functions. In addition
to evidence that educational psychology has indeed provided insights useful for
pedagogical practice (cf. Berliner & Calfee, 1996; Bransford et al., 2000), empirical
evidence for the effectiveness of this particular way of utilizing psychology as to-be-
applied-principles was for instance long since provided by Anderson, Evertson, and
Brophy (1979).
The second point constitutes a rather high-stake claim. Namely, to the extent
that by fulfilling the steps proposed above we can apply valid understanding of
psychological processes involved in the learning and teaching functions discussed
here, then we should be able to claim at least that teaching thus analysed as having
greater LPP in a particular educational situation ought, other things equal, to be more
effective than teaching thus analysed as having a lesser LPP. Were even this more
qualified claim not to be borne out, it would indeed be a blow to the practical
relevance of psychology. Conversely, however, it must also be emphasized again
that testing such a claim would require successful implementation of the various
operationalization steps proposed above. It may be mentioned that a recent
comparative case study designed to do precisely that (Odiemo, 2005) did produce
positive results regarding this claim.

From psychology to pedagogy

By contrast with those inhabiting the world of teaching, those coming from psychology
to pedagogy will virtually by definition take an opposite approach. Explicitly or
implicitly, they are starting from the view that psychological understanding can and
should be usefully applied in teaching, and, as the already converted, they are likely to
find the previous sections arguments time-wastingly obvious. As psychologists used to
the empirical investigation of specific issues, they may even be unsympathetic to what is
essentially conceptual, meta-theoretical analysis at a general level. What does the LPP
approach have to say to this group?
At least two kinds of considerations would seem worth offering. First, that when
moving from psychological theory to pedagogy, psychologists may have a tendency
simply to come up with and test the effectiveness of a single concrete teaching strategy.
This strategy may in turn become identified with the psychological ideas in question,
when actually other strategies might also have the potential to embody the relevant
processes. A nice example of how not to fall into such narrowness can be taken from the
impressive work of Chi (Chi & Ohlsson, 2005; de Leeuw & Chi, 2002) showing that
the teaching strategy of having students self-explain a physics problem helps them
understand it more deeply, because in terms of learning functions, I would say it
forces them to articulate and often repair their mental models of the domain. Chis work
also suggests that the potential to do this is shared by the teaching strategy of peer
tutoring, but that the more traditional strategy of tutors offering explanations cold has,
in our terms, little LPP, rather that such explanations must build on students own efforts
at construction and repair.
As well as potentially restricting consideration of alternative teaching approaches, it
may also be pointed out that the possible association of psychological ideas with
particular pedagogical strategies would also tend to perpetuate what, along with Oser
and Baeriswyl (2001), I have lamented as the unfortunate general educator tendency to
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The learning promotion potential framework 523

think in terms just of overt teaching strategies and to ignore the psychological work they
must achieve.
A second point to make in this context involves an LPP-based version of long-
standing educationist complaints about the ecological validity or real-life feasibility of
the theories and strategies educational psychology comes up with. Working from a
particular theoretical viewpoint may namely tend to mean dealing explicitly only with
the pedagogical issues highlighted by such a viewpoint, in line with the Kellyan point
cited earlier. It should be pointed out that such selective applications of psychology
are by no means necessarily restricted to those coming from psychology, but can
equally arise when, for instance, a particular subject teaching community develops a
relatively exclusive devotion to a particular psychological viewpoint as its silver
bullet paradigm, as arguably happened with science educations attachment to
individual constructivism in the 1980s (e.g. Driver, 1983). The point to be made here
is that any aspects of the teaching interaction that the theory does not deal with may
not arise as issues or simply be filled in implicitly, thereby having their ignoral
reinforced, for instance when the teaching strategy is tested in artificially privileged
situations, such as a one-to-one interaction. In a more typically situated teaching
interaction, however, a wide range of other issues, including access, management and
motivation of a larger number of differing learners, are going to require explicit
attention.
To conclude and summarize, then, the main implication of the above points would
appear to be that when seeking to inform pedagogy with psychology, awareness is
required equally of the key learning embodiment and teacher assistance/monitoring
functions of teaching, the range and status of available psychological resources, and the
ways in which these two sets may be related. The LPP/critical eclecticism framework is
offered as a tool that may help structure such awareness and make these connections.

Acknowledgements
I thank Janet Hodgson, Robin Millar, Luke Odiemo, Jean-Luc Patry, and Phil Scott for their very
helpful comments and discussion on earlier drafts of this paper.

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Received 26 May 2006; revised version received 23 April 2008