Structural Learning: How Organising Knowledge Builds Understanding
Explore how structural learning enables students to organize knowledge, fostering deeper understanding and meaningful connections in their educational journey.
Key Takeaways
- Structure Supports Meaning: When students learn to recognise and use structural patterns, they develop deeper understanding of how ideas connect and relate.
- From Novice to Expert: Experts in any domain see structure that novices miss. Teaching structural patterns explicitly accelerates this development.
- Transfer Through Structure: Students who understand underlying structures can transfer learning to new contexts more effectively than those who learn only surface features.
- Thinking Made Visible: Structural tools like graphic organisers externalise thinking, reducing cognitive load and making reasoning visible for feedback and development through dialogic approaches.
What Is Structural Learning?
Structural learning focuses on the patterns, frameworks, and relationships that organise knowledge within and across domains. Rather than teaching content as isolated facts, structural learning emphasises how ideas connect, how processes unfold, and how concepts relate to each other through systems thinking.
The term "structural learning" encompasses various teaching strategies including graphic organisers, thinking maps, conceptual frameworks, and explicit teaching of text structures. What unites these ap proaches is attention to the underlying architecture of knowledge rather than just its surface features.
Why Does Structure Matter for Student Understanding?
Structure matters because understanding requires grasping how facts relate to each other within broader frameworks, not just memorizing isolated information. Students who understand underlying structures can see meaningful patterns and connections that lead to deeper comprehension. Research shows that experts in any field succeed by recognising structural patterns that novices miss.
Understanding is not simply knowing more facts but grasping how facts relate to each other and to broader frameworks. A student who can list the stages of the water cycle has knowledge; a student who understands why water moves through the cycle, how each stage causes the next, and how the cycle connects to weather and climate has understanding.
Research on expertise reveals that experts in any domain perceive structure that novices miss. Expert chess players see meaningful patterns where novices see individual pieces. Expert readers recognise text structures that help them predict and remember content. This structural knowledge is a key component of expertise and forms part of students' cultural capital. It can be taught through effective pedagogy and supports meaningful pupil progress through pedagogical approaches like the spiral curriculum.
What Are Common Structural Patterns Across Different Subjects?
Common structural patterns include cause-and-effect relationships, compare-contrast frameworks, sequential processes, and hierarchical classifications. These patterns appear across all subjects, from the water cycle in science to plot structures in literature. Teaching students to recognise these universal patterns helps them transfer learning between subjects more effectively.
| Structural Pattern | Description | Examples Across Subjects |
|---|---|---|
| Sequence/Process | Steps that follow in order | Historical timeline, scientific process, narrative plot |
| Compare/Contrast | Similarities and differences | Historical periods, literary characters, scientific concepts |
| Cause/Effect | Events and their consequences | Historical causation, scientific reactions, story events |
| Problem/Solution | Challenge and response | Historical conflicts, engineering design, story resolution |
| Part/Whole | Components of a larger system | Body systems, government branches, literary devices |
| Classification | Categories and subcategories | Scientific taxonomy, genre classification, grammatical categories |
How Do Graphic Organisers Support Structural Learning?
Graphic organisers make thinking visible by externalizing the relationships between ideas, which reduces cognitive loadand helps students process complex information. They provide visual frameworks that show how concepts connect, making abstract relationships concrete and easier to understand. Teachers can use them to scaffold student thinking and provide targeted feedback on reasoning processes.
Graphic organisers make structural relationships visible. A Venn diagram reveals comparison structure. A flow chart shows sequential processes. A concept map displays hierarchical and lateral relationships. By externalising structure, graphic organisers reduce cognitive load and support thinking.
Research supports the effectiveness of graphic organisers, but with important caveats. They are most effective when students understand why the organiser has its particular shape, when they are matched to the conceptual structure being learned, and when students eventually transition from using provided organisers to creating their own.
Selecting Appropriate Organisers
The organiser should match the conceptual structure. A timeline for sequential events; a matrix for comparison; a flowchart for processes; a concept map for interconnected ideas. Using a mismatched organiser can actually impair understanding by imposing an inappropriate structure on the content.
From Provided to Created
Initially, teachers may provide completed or partially completed organisers. As students develop structural awareness, they should progress to completing blank organisers, then selecting appropriate organiser types, and ultimately creating their own representations. This progression develops the structural thinking that organisers are meant to support.
How Can Teachers Effectively Teach Text Structure?
Teachers can teach text structure by explicitly identifying organisational patterns like problem-solution, chronological order, or comparison in the texts students read. Start by modelling how to recognise signal words and structural cues, then provide guided practice with various text types. Regular practice with different text structures helps students predict content and improve comprehension across all subjects.
Written texts have structural patterns that proficient readers recognise and use. Research shows that explicit teaching of text structures improves reading comprehension. When students recognise that a passage is organised as problem-solution, they can predict the kind of information to expect and organise it accordingly.
Strategies include teaching signal words that indicate structure (first, next, finally for sequence; however, in contrast for comparison; as a result, therefore for cause-effect), using graphic organisers matched to text structures, and writing in different structures to reinforce understanding.
How Does Structural Learning Promote Knowledge Transfer?
Structural learning promotes transfer by teaching students to recognise underlying patterns that apply across different contexts and subjects. When students understand the structure of cause-and-effect in science, they can apply this same framework to historical events or literary analysis. This deep structural understanding enables students to use their learning in new situations rather than treating each topic as isolated.
One of the key benefits of structural learning is enhanced transfer. Students who understand underlying structures can apply their learning to new contexts more effectively than those who have learned only surface features. A student who understands cause-and-effect structure can apply this framework in science, history, and literature, even though the content differs completely.
This has implications for curriculum design. Teaching for transfer requires making structural patterns explicit, drawing attention to similarities across contexts, and providing opportunities to apply structures in varied settings.
Structural Learning in Different Subjects
Mathematics
Mathematical understanding involves recognising structural patterns: the structure of equations, the relationships between operations, the patterns in number systems. Students who see that 3 + 5 = 8 shares a structure with 3x + 5 = 8 have deeper understanding than those who treat these as unrelated problems.
Science
Scientific concepts are full of structural relationships: systems and components, cause and effect, cycles and processes. Teaching the structural patterns of scientific thinking, not just scientific facts, develops scientific literacy.
English
Texts are structured at multiple levels: sentence structure, paragraph structure, whole-text structure, and genre conventions. Understanding these structures supports both comprehension and composition.
History
Historical thinking involves structural patterns: cause and consequence, change and continuity, similarity and difference. Making these patterns explicit helps students think historically rather than simply learning historical content.
How Can Schools Implement Structural Learning Approaches?
Schools can implement structural learning by training teachers to explicitly teach organisational patterns and providing consistent graphic organisers across grade levels. Start with a few key structures and gradually expand, ensuring students encounter the same frameworks in multiple subjects. Create visual displays of common structures and encourage teachers to reference them regularly during instruction.
Structural learning is not a separate programme but an approach that can be integrated across teaching:
Make structures explicit: Do not assume students will notice structural patterns. Name them, point them out, and discuss why they matter.
Use consistent vocabulary: When students hear "cause and effect" in science, history, and English, using the same terms, they begin to recognise the transferable pattern.
Provide appropriate tools: Graphic organisers, thinking maps, and structured frameworks support structural learning when well-matched to content.
Progress toward independence: Begin with explicit teaching and provided structures, progress toward student-generated representations of structure.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is structural learning the same as graphic organisers?
Graphic organisers are tools for structural learning, but structural learning is broader. It includes recognising patterns in texts, understanding conceptual relationships, and developing the kind of structural awareness that characterises expert thinking. Graphic organisers support these goals but are not the whole of structural learning.
Does structural learning work for all students?
Research suggests structural approaches benefit most students, particularly those who may otherwise miss implicit patterns. However, the level of scaffolding needed varies. Some students need extensive explicit teaching of structures; others may recognise patterns more readily but still benefit from structural tools that reduce cognitive load.
How does structural learning relate to knowledge-rich curricula?
Structural learning and knowledge-rich approaches are complementary. Knowledge provides the content; structural learning helps organise that content into coherent, connected understanding. Facts without structure remain isolated; structure without facts is empty. Effective teaching addresses both.
Can students develop structural awareness independently?
Some students do develop structural awareness through extensive experience, but many do not. Explicit teaching accelerates this development and ensures that all students, not just those who intuitively perceive patterns, develop structural understanding. As with other forms of learning, what can be discovered can usually be taught more efficiently.
Further Reading: Key Research Papers
These peer-reviewed studies provide deeper insights into structural learning: how organising knowledge builds understanding and its application in educational settings.
Accommodation of a scientific conception: Toward a theory of conceptual change 5457 citations
Posner et al. (1982)
This foundational paper presents a theory of how students change their understanding when learning new scientific concepts, focusing on the conditions needed for students to abandon existing misconceptions and adopt new, more accurate scientific ideas. For teachers implementing structural learning approaches, this research provides crucial insights into how students' prior knowledge structures can either support or hinder new learning, and offers strategies for helping students reorganise their conceptual frameworks effectively.
Research on data visualisation literacy frameworks245 citations (Author, Year) provides comprehensive definitions, conceptual models, practical exercises, and assessment methods for developing students' ability to interpret and create visual representations of data across educational contexts.
Börner et al. (2019)
This paper defines data visualision literacy as a critical 21st-century skill and provides frameworks for teaching students how to read, interpret, and create visual representations of information. Teachers using structural learning approaches will find this relevant because it demonstrates how visual organisational tools like graphs, charts, and diagrams can be systematically taught as knowledge structures that enhance studentunderstanding across subjects.
Characterizing the biomechanical differences between novice and expert point‐of‐care ultrasound practitioners using a low‐cost gyroscope and accelerometer integrated sensor: A pilot study 3 citations
Prager et al. (2022)
This study uses motion sensors to analyse the physical hand movements of medical professionals learning ultrasound techniques, comparing how novices and experts differ in their technical skills development. While highly specialised, this research illustrates how expertise involves developing structured procedural knowledge and motor patterns, which connects to broader principles about how students organise and refine their understanding through practice.
Teacher Knowledge for Active-Learning Instruction: Expert, Novice Comparison Reveals Differences 54 citations
Auerbach et al. (2018)
This research compares how expert and novice teachers think about and implement active learningstrategies in college biology courses, revealing that experts focus on different instructional elements and reason more deeply about student learning. Teachers interested in structural learning will benefit from understanding how expert educators organise their pedagogical knowledge and make decisions about structuring learning experiences for maximum student comprehension.
Research on interdisciplinary approaches to science education 65 citations (Author, Year) explores the historical development and conceptual frameworks that support integrated teaching methods, demonstrating how cross-curricular connections enhance student understanding of scientific concepts and their real-world applications.
You et al. (2017)
This paper explores the history, current trends, and theoretical frameworks supporting interdisciplinary science education, arguing for teaching approaches that connect knowledge across traditional subject boundaries. Teachers implementing structural learning will find this valuable because it demonstrates how organising knowledge around interdisciplinary themes and connections can deepen student understanding and make learning more meaningful and coherent.
