Is Meaning Making Constructivism? Is Constructivism Meaning Making? 1

Abstract

Is Meaning Making Constructivism? Is Constructivism Meaning Making? Short answers to these two questions are “No” and “Yes,” respectively. The two terms, although frequently confused, are not synonymous. Their formal relationship is straightforward: meaning making is a general term that refers to what visitors inevitably do in museums. Constructivism is a particular educational theory that not only acknowledges visitor meaning making but uses it as a central component of a definition of education. All discussions of constructivism include meaning-making; but meaning-making, (although often appropriately called “knowledge construction”) does not necessarily imply Constructivism.