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THE LEARNING THEORIES

Learning Theory describe how students absorb, process, and retain knowledge during learning. Cognitive, emotional, and environmental influences, as well as prior experience, all play a part in how understanding, or a world view, is acquired or changed and knowledge and skills retained.

Behaviorists look at learning as an aspect of conditioning and advocate a system of rewards and targets in education. Educators who embrace cognitive theory believe that the definition of learning as a change in behaviour is too narrow, and study the learner rather than their environment—and in particular the complexities of human memory. Those who advocate constructivism believe that a learner's ability to learn relies largely on what they already know and understand, and the acquisition of knowledge should be an individually tailored process of construction. Transformative learning theory focuses on the often-necessary change required in a learner's preconceptions and world view. Geographical learning theory focuses on the ways that contexts and environments shape the learning process.

Outside the realm of educational psychology, techniques to directly observe the functioning of the brain during the learning process, such as event-related potential and functional magnetic resonance imaging, are used in educational neuroscience. The theory of multiple intelligences, where learning is seen as the interaction between dozens of different functional areas in the brain each with their own individual strengths and weaknesses in any particular human learner, has also been proposed, but empirical research has found the theory to be unsupported by evidence.

THREE LEARNING THEORIES

Learning Theories are frameworks that are extensively used by Instructional Designers to meet the requirements of the target audience and the situation.

To do justice to this mandate, an Instructional Designer must first understand the Learning Theories in order to apply them. Once they understand the strengths and weaknesses of each Learning Theory, they can optimise their use. In this blog, I provide an introduction to three traditional Learning Theories, namely:

1.   Behaviourism

2.   Cognitivism

3.   Constructivism

Furthermore, I show examples that illustrate how they can be used in designing eLearning courses.

BEHAVIOURAL THEORY

Behavioral Theories: the history of psychology is the history of a field struggling to define itself as a separate and unique scientific discipline. (Hockenbury, 3) While the roots of psychology date back to the philosophers of Ancient Greece, it wasn’t until 1879, when German psychologist Wilhelm Wundt created the first laboratory completely devoted to the study of psychology. (Kleinman, 7)

The history (of the study of behavior) is built upon the theories and discoveries of successive generations, with many of the older theories remaining relevant to contemporary psychologists. The behaviorists felt that it was impossible to study mental processes objectively, but found it relatively easy to observe and measure behavior. (Collin, 10) Editor’s note - behaviorism, cognitivism, and psychoanalytic theory are considered ‘grand theories of psychology.’ This means they are comprehensive theories which have traditionally inspired and directed psychologists’ thinking. Psychology's grand theories also refer to 'psychology schools' and 'psychology therapies’ and behavioral theories are also referred to as ‘psychology theories.’

COGNITIVIST THEORY

Cognitivism is a learning theory that focuses on the processes involved in learning rather than on the observed behavior. As opposed to Behaviorists, Cognitivists do not require an outward exhibition of learning, but focus more on the internal processes and connections that take place during learning. Cognitivism contends that “the black box” of the mind should be opened and understood. The learner is viewed as an information processor.  Knowledge can be seen as schema or symbolic mental constructions and learning is defined as change in a learner’s schemata. Some important classroom principles from cognitive psychology include meaningful learning, organization, and elaboration.       

          

CONSTRUCTIVIST THEORY

Constructivism in education is an epistemological perspective of learning focused on how students actively create (or “construct”) knowledge out of their experiences. Emphasis is placed on agency and prior "knowing" and experience of the learner, which is often determined by their social and cultural contexts environment. While Behaviorist models of learning may help understand what students are doing, educators also need to know what students are thinking, and how to enrich what students are thinking.

Constructivism can be traced back to educational psychology in the work of Jean Piaget (1896–1980) identified with Piaget's theory of cognitive development, and from Lev Vygotsky's (1896-1934) social constructivism. Piaget focused on how humans make meaning in relation to the interaction between their experiences and their ideas. His views tended to focus on human development in relation to what is occurring with an individual as distinct from development influenced by other persons. Vygotsky emphasized the importance of sociocultural learning; how interactions with adults, more capable peers, and cognitive tools are internalized by learners to form mental constructs through the zone of proximal development. Expanding upon Vygotsky's theory Jerome Bruner and other educational psychologists developed the important concept of instructional scaffolding, whereby the social or informational environment offers supports (or scaffolds) for learning that are gradually withdrawn as they become internalized.

Views more focused on human development in the context of the social world include the sociocultural or socio-historical perspective of Lev Vygotsky and the situated cognitionperspectives of Mikhail Bakhtin, Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger;^[3] Brown, Collins and Duguid; Newman, Griffin and Cole, and Barbara Rogoff.

The concept of constructivism has influenced a number of disciplines, including psychology, sociology, education and the history of science.^[7] During its infancy, constructivism examined the interaction between human experiences and their reflexes or behavior-patterns. Piaget called these systems of knowledge "schemes."

Schemes are not to be confused with schema, a term that comes from schema theory, which is from information-processing perspectives on human cognition. Whereas Piaget's schemes are content-free, schemata (the plural of schema) are concepts; for example, most humans have a schema for "grandmother", "egg", or "magnet."

Constructivism does not refer to a specific pedagogy, although it is often confused with constructionism, an educational theory developed by Seymour Papert, inspired by constructivist and experiential learning ideas of Piaget.

Piaget's theory of constructivist learning has had wide-ranging impact on learning theories and teaching methods in education, and is an underlying theme of education reform movements. Research support for constructivist teaching techniques has been mixed, with some studies in support and others contradicting constructivist results.

THE SOCIAL FAMILY

In the context of human society, a family (from Latin: familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth), affinity (by marriage or other relationship), or co-residence (as implied by the etymology of the English word "family") or some combination of these. Members of the immediate family may include spouses, parents, brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters. Members of the extended family may include grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces, and siblings-in-law. Sometimes these are also considered members of the immediate family, depending on an individual's specific relationship with them.

In most societies, the family is the principal institution for the socialization of children. As the basic unit for raising children, anthropologists generally classify most family organizations as matrifocal (a mother and her children); conjugal (a wife, her husband, and children, also called the nuclear family); avuncular (for example, a grandparent, a brother, his sister, and her children); or extended (parents and children co-reside with other members of one parent's family). Sexual relations among the members are regulated by rules concerning incest such as the incest taboo.

THE INFORMATION PROCESSING FAMILY

Joyce and Weil (1985) define models of teaching as a plan or pattern that can be used to shape curriculum, to design instructional materials, and to guide instruction in the classroom and other settings. Models of teaching differ from general approaches of teaching in that they are designed to realize specific instructional objectives. General approaches of teaching are considered to be applicable to all teaching situations. They are prescriptive teaching strategies to realize specific instructional goals. By exploring many sources, Joyce and Weil have grouped the models on the basis of specific educational goals and means into the following four families:

   1.      Information processing models

   2.      Social interaction models

   3.      Personal development models

   4.      Behaviour modification models

Information Processing Models

            The term ‘information processing’ has been introduced by Joyce and Weils (1972). In their words, Information processing refers to the ways people handle stimuli from the environment, organize data, sense problems, generate concepts and solutions to problems and employ verbal and non-verbal symbols.

            Thus, the information processing models are more concerned with the intellectual growth rather than the emotional or social development of the individual. They are oriented toward the information capacity of the students. Some information processing models are to concern with the ability of the learner to solve problems and thus emphasis productive thinking, other, are concerned with general intellectual ability.

 The teaching models in this family emphasize peoples’ desires to make sense of the world by gathering and organizing data, determining problems, and finding solutions. Models are put into the Information Processing family if they seek ways of helping process information better and if their goal is to help students become more powerful learners.

THE BEHAVIOURAL SYSTEM FAMILY

Behavioral Systems Family of Models: Principles

• ·         Behavior is an Observable, Identifiable Phenomenon
• ·         Maladaptive Behaviors are Acquired
• ·         Behavioral Goals are Specific, Discrete, and Individual
• ·         Behavioral Theory Focuses on the Here-and-Now

Behavioral Systems Family of Models: Tips for Teaching

• •        Use positive rules with positive reinforcers
• •        Praise on-task students rather than reprimanding off-task students
• •        Allow students to teach themselves when possible because it allows students to control their own learning schedule.
• •        Teach students relaxation techniques and allow them to regulate their own behavior
• •        When students are anxious or fidgety, do not provide negative reinforcement.
• •        Allowing students to score their own work and correct their own papers provides motivation.

THE PERSONAL FAMILY

The family is a domestic group with a lasting association, which the members may or not be biologically related. It functions as a unit for the purposes of resource sharing and providing mutual emotional support while perpetuating tradition and values.

This definition incorporates several parts of familial components. The structure is defined within the first sentence. The function of the family in this definition is present in the second part of the definition. Both the cultural and emotional aspects are integrated into the functioning of the family as a unit. While my definition is fairly broad, it still lacks familial roles and procedures, and legalities. In doing so it disregards sexual regulations and the possibility to grant services. Here two problems lie. One is that the more inclusive the definition of family, the less meaningful it becomes. Then another problem is created given that most Americans desire to be part of a "family" and want to be incorporated into its official definition yet not everyone fits the same mold. Hence the question of who or what a family is cannot be answered. Therefore the very definition of what constitutes a family needs to be evaluated.

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