Psychology Perspectives on Learning

Beatrice Washington

Rachel Lawrence

The four major Perspectives of Learning that we are going to discuss are Behaviorist Perspective, Cognitivist Perspective, Constructivist Perspective and Social Psychological Perspective. We will also discuss what their implications are in learning.

Behaviorist Perspective

B. F. Skinner was a proponent of the behaviorist perspective. He believed if you rewarded desired response you could shape one's behavior. Skinner also believed that voluntary beharior such as learning new skills was not just regurgitation. His work helped to develop computer-assisted instruction which has many uses in today's classroom. Skinner's approach to behavior was very logical and precise and this helped to improved the learning of basic skills. The drawback to his work is that it relied only on observable behavior and therefore it could only be used on the basic and simple learning task. Skinner's scientific approach to observation shows that behaviorism has limited applications in teaching higher-level skills.

Cognitivist Prospective

Cognitivism is based on work by Jean Peaget (1977). "Cognitivism deals with how people think, solve problems and make decisions" (Smaldino, S., Lowther, D., & Russell, J., 2008). Unlike behaviorist, cognitivist makes a mental picture of information. This information is stored in a short-term memory spot and as new information is gather and rehearsed the cognitivist adds the rehearsed portion to the short-term memory that it already has. A new spot is created for the information that does not fit. Once the short term memory is fully rehearsed it is then stored as long-term memory and the process repeats itself and learning takes place. Since short-term memory and long-term memory keep evolving, learners take information and skills in the long-term memory and develop new cognitive strategies for dealing with complex task. Therefore higher-level skills are being developed. Cognitivist prospective has a wider realm of learning than that of the behaviorist prospective. Students are able to be more self reliant and a teacher then becomes a facilitator.

Constructivism Prospective

The overall means of constructivism is that children are able to create a coherent system of knowledge based on their interactions with the world. "This perspective considers the engagement of students in meaningful experiences as the essence of experimental learning" (Smaldino, S., Lowther, D., & Russell, J., 2008). The constructivist perspective on learning allows students to relate problem solving techniques along with discovery. Learners can create their own interpretations of given information. "The emphasis on the constructivist perspective is on learning through action. While action refers to mental action, young children are most active mentally when they are physically engaged in figuring out how to do something" (Constructivist perspective, 2002). In order to teach with this method, students should be provided with ways to assemble knowledge, rather than merely basic facts. The ultimate goal of this perspective is to allow students to base their learning on their own use of knowledge to facilitate their thinking in real life.

Social-Psychological Perspective

The social-psychological perspective suggests looking at the organization of the classroom on learning. Within this approach, it is beneficial for students to use cooperative learning so that they can more socially benefit through competitive and individualistic learning. Some cooperative learning techniques include small-group collaboration, learner-controlled instruction, and rewards for group achievement. Through teaching with this approach, students can relate to one another and benefit socially through learning.

Resources:

Smaldino, S., Lowther, D., & Russell, j. (2008). Insturctional technology and media for learning. Columbus: Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall.

(220) Constructivist perspective. University of Kansas Inclusion Project. Http://www.circleofinclusion.org/english/approaches/kamii.html