Educational Psychology / Unit 5 EDP 0426 worked example, 60 to 90 seconds
Classifying Cognitive Load
The idea
To classify a demand on a learner's working memory, ask where it comes from. Intrinsic load comes from the material's own complexity, the number of elements that must be handled at once; practice reduces it, but some tasks stay complex. Extraneous load comes from demands irrelevant to learning, such as confusing layout or decoration, and is largely under the teacher's control. Germane load is effort that serves the learning goal itself, added once the basics are automatic.
In practice
Worked example: students learning fractions must also decode dense instructions full of unfamiliar words. The fractions are intrinsic load; the wording is extraneous load a teacher can cut.
Where people slip
The same feature can change category with the goal: unfamiliar vocabulary is extraneous in a math lesson but germane in a vocabulary lesson. Simplify intrinsic load at first and build up; reduce extraneous load; add germane load only when capacity allows.
Your place on the trail
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