Jerome Bruner was an early initiator of discovery learning environments. He believes that for learning to be meaningful, students must actively be engaged in identifying principles, rules, etc., for themselves, rather than relying on a teacher's explanations. Therefore, learning environments must provide situations in which students are called upon to question, explore, or experiment. Inductive reasoning (formulating general principles based on knowledge of examples and details) is a highly important aspect of discovery learning. In typical discovery learning environments, information and examples are presented to the students, and the students work with the information and examples until they "discover" the interrelationships.
Inductive approaches to learning require intuitive thinking. In many discovery learning environments, the teacher can encourage intuitive thinking by having students make guesses based on incomplete evidence and then having them confirm or disprove the guesses.

Learning by discovery is centered around a series of problem-solving investigations that actively involve students.

A general pattern can have the following elements:

1. A question or series of questions is raised, and through discussion a problem is identified (a question to be answered).

2. With the help of the teacher, the students propose ways of investigating the problem and gathering data.

3. Working either individually or in small groups, the students conduct investigations in which they manipulate phenomena, make observations, gather and interpret data, and draw inferences (called a solution).

4. At the end of the activity, students figure out what their data mean or say, draw conclusions, make generalizations, and answer the question.

Sources
1. Sprinthall, Norman and Sprinthall, Richard, Educational Psychology