The paper describes the principles underlying situated cognition linked to the Vygotskian sociocultural perspective, which state that situated cognition is both a part and the result of activity, context and culture. It highlights the importance of mediation, the joint construction of meaning and the mechanism of adapted assistance. There are examples of instructional approaches which vary in cultural relevance and the type of social activity they elicit. It also presents a number of meaningful learning strategies based on situated experiential teaching (authentic problem solving, learning while in service, case studies, projects, situated simulation, among others). Finally, the paper deals with the potentiality of empowerment.

Key words: Situated cognition, sociocultural approach, teaching strategies, meaningful learning, experiential teaching, empowerment.