Wednesday, March 25, 2009

What is learning?

I create this thread for all us to post our answers.
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2 comments:

Victor said...

It is a question I think about all the time when I was in the school of education. Here are some thoughts:

Here is my definition: learning has to be visible. I am not a behaviorist to say that there is a stimulus-response relationship. I mean that in a "normal" situation, people should be able to "apply" what they've learned in a reasonable among of time/with reasonable amount of feedback.

So, normal situation means that we don't have to design a particular special way to help "a student" to apply what he/she's learned. Using driving a car as an example, we assume that a person can drive a passenger car or even a passenger van in a normal road in America (or even in many different countries).

Apply probably means transfer. When we learn some principles and apply in some contexts. We should be expected to apply those principles in "normal" context. For example, when a student learn Java programming at school. He/she should be able to do some simple java programming at work. If he/she has to, probably he/she can pick up a book and learn C++ or VB in a short period of time. I assume that there are some work specific parameters may not be the same in different companies. So, some initial help is probably needed to get started.

Third, I expect learners can apply the knowledge in a reasonable among of time. In the real world, we are asked to job in a reasonable period of time. As we develop expertise, the reasonable time for completion decrease. And, hopefully, we will be promoted and don't need to do the task, but managing the task.

Finally, I expect learners make mistake when applying the knowledge. Experts made mistake once a while. So, it is normal to expect learners will make mistakes. But, I expect learners are about to "pick up feedback" early enough (or learn to ask good questions/use of sandbox). When I write, I feel that this seems like a general skill instead of domain specific skill. Maybe I am wrong.

March 25, 2009 at 3:54 PM
Nelson said...

man...you guys are on fire about learning. Before define learning, I did appreaciate Diane's critical thinking on the science of teaching for far transfer learning.

I concur with the principles suggested by the articles as valid and draw from cognitive, constructivist instructional approaches.

Ideally, learners should be congitively flexible (ability to restructure knowledge and adapat to changing situation). Sadly, most of K-20 education did poorly on teaching high-order thinking skills (e.g. problem solving) to students.

Now about what is learning?...Learning is a change in behavior (skills), in mental representation (knowledge), in attitudes as a result of experiences in learner's life.

March 25, 2009 at 11:48 PM

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