Conditions of Learning - Research Paper Example

Conditions of Learning Abstract For decades now, Robert Gagne’s theory of conditions of learning has enjoyed popularity among scholars of psychology and other disciplines. Gagne identified five major categories of learning namely, attitudes, verbal information, cognitive strategies, motor skills and intellectual skills. Gagne justified the five categories on the basis that each category requires specific methods of instruction. He argued that knowledge of the five levels of learning is important as each level demands specific conditions of learning on both the learner and their environment. Moreover, each level needs specific methods of instruction. However, a major weakness of Gagne's model is that portrays the teacher as the expert who knows it all including which method of instruction to adopt where, while ignoring the role of the learner in the learning process. Different learners have different needs and learn by different methods. Hence, whenever possible, the method of instruction should be modified to meet the unique needs of a particular learner. Introduction Robert Gagne’s theory of conditions of learning stipulates that there are various categories of learning [Gag77]. Gagne identified the five major categories of learning: attitudes, verbal information, cognitive strategies, motor skills, and intellectual skills. Gagne justified the five categories on the basis that each category requires specific methods of instruction. At the same time, each level of learning demands from the learner a unique set of internal and external conditions [Gag77]. For example, for a nursing student to learn the attitude toward the patient that is required of them, they must interact with a role model nurse. This paper analyzes five academic sources on the subject of conditions of learning; each source covers one of the five levels of learning identified by Gagne. Gagne’s model is paternalistic: it presents the instructor as the person who knows it all including the method of teaching to be employed, without paying attention to the personality of learner and their unique learning needs. Discussion Cognitive Strategies The purpose of cognitive learning is to develop the ability of the learner to think critically about practical, real-life problems and devise practical, well-though solutions to those problems [Gro11]. Thus, one of the skills required of the learner is the skill to think critically and analytically. A study by Debora Grossmann revealed that many adult learners of English as a second language have trouble in developing cognitive skills. Grossmann, herself an adult teacher of English as a second language divided her students into two groups: the successful versus the unsuccessful learners. The study investigated the relationship between cognitive skills and the teaching methods that teachers of English as a second language use to impart those skills. The study concluded that there exists a relationship between the two variable – cognitive skills and the methods used to impart them [Gro11]. Therefore, teachers of English as a second language need to adopt instruction methods that suit the needs of the unsuccessful learners. Attitudes Some health care practitioners believe that by working together in interdisciplinary teams they can significantly improve the quality of care they give to their clients [Hor01]. It was against this backdrop that Margaret Horsburgh et. al carried out a study to investigate the attitudes of medicine, nursing and pharmacy toward the concept of “shared learning”. The study involved first-year students of nursing, pharmacy and medicine from the University of Auckland to whom the Readiness for Inter-professional Learning Scale, developed by the University of Liverpool's Department of Health Care Education, was administered. The majority of the students, except those studying medicine, were receptive toward shared learning [Hor01]. The finding of the study implies that students of medicine may have certain negative attitudes towards their counterparts in the health care field. While the exact nature and causes of these attitudes are not known, it is unlikely that medical students would benefit from common classes with the other students in the health care department. Thus, a department of health care that seeks to deploy the shared learning model may first need to investigate the attitudes of the students in the various disciplines towards each other. Intellectual Skills Traditionally, scholarly writing has demanded intellectual skills of a higher degree from professors and their students. The so-called Information Age has increased the pressure on scholars to produce academic papers of high quality [Int85]. The Information Age has availed an avalanche of information that is readily accessible through the Internet. However, not all this information is of academic quality. In addition, the available quality academic materials are scattered in numerous sites. One of the intellectual skills is the skill to search academic sources from which to draw citations for academic papers. The other intellectual skill is that of synthesis – the ability to piece together information from different sources into a coherent paper. In searching and synthesizing information, the scholar must be both discerning and analytical so that they do not reproduce irrelevant information in their paper. Other intellectual skills include the skills of inference and verification. Unlike their seasoned professors, most students struggle to produce quality academic papers. Janet Donald appears oblivious of this fact and talks of professors and their students as though they were a homogenous mass. Motor Skills A motor skill is a natural, effortless movement of a muscle that is necessary to perform a given task [Ros01]. Basic motor skills are acquired during infancy through childhood, although different children develop them at different rates due to several factors. Some of the factors such as inherited traits and learning disorders may not be controlled. Others such as the environment in which the child is raised are controllable. There is a set of motor skills referred to as perceptual motor skills. These skills enable a person to interact with their environment and include postural adjustment and eye-hand coordination among others. Research has shown that people acquire perceptual motor skills in the same manner as they do intellectual skills. Like the basic motor skills, different people acquire perceptual motor skills at different rates. For instance, in a reading skills class, different students will develop the good eye-book coordination skill, hence good reading habits, at different paces. Different factors explain the differences. For instance, psychologists agree that the early childhood environment plays a role in determining whether a person becomes a slow or a fast learner [Ros01]. Overall, a child brought up in urban setting is more likely to develop perceptive motor skills at an earlier age than their rural counterpart. Verbal Information A closer reading of Gagne reveals that by “learning” he means the type of formal learning that takes place in the classroom or its substitute. However, verbal communication is applicable to a range of situations from the classroom setting to a casual conversation between friends. Robert Krauss argues that a verbal communication, whether formal or informal, is an interactive exchange that requires the input of both the listener and the speaker [Kra01]. Krauss then goes ahead to discuss what he calls "communication paradigms". The first communication paradigm is encoding and decoding. In essence, encoding entails packaging a verbal message in words that are understandable to the listener. Upon hearing what the speaker has said, the listener decodes the message, that is, they derive the intended meaning of the words. Krauss calls the second paradigm "communicative intentions", by which term he means the intended meaning of an utterance that, in many situations, is prone to misinterpretation. The third paradigm is perspective-taking: different listeners will interpret the same utterance differently based on their experiences. The fourth paradigm is dialogism: both the speaker and the listener should alternate roles, or else the communication becomes a monologue. While Krauss has articulated the verbal communication process fairly well, he has failed to take into account the traits of the speaker and the listener that are likely to affect the communication. For instance, if either party is too talkative to listen, the communication is likely to be ineffective and frustrating to the less talkative party. Conclusion Robert Gagne's categorization of levels of learning is both important and practical. However, the scholar's use of the levels of learning as the basis for determining the methods of instruction is inadequate. The specific teaching method adopted should be informed by the unique needs of the learner or learners. For instance, the needs of slow-learning students are different from those of their normal counterparts. Therefore, by adopting a uniform teaching method for both groups, the teacher places the slow learners at somewhat of a disadvantage. In addition, the method of instruction should be guided by the specific objective of a given learning exercise. References Gag77: , (Gagne, 1977), Gro11: , (Grossman, 2011), Hor01: , (Horsbburg, Lamdin, & Williamson, 2001), Int85: , (Donald, 1985), Ros01: , (Rosenbaum, Carlson, & Rick, 2001), Kra01: , (Krauss, 2001), Read More