Learning happens both formally and informally and is happening every day. From an informal view of learning, children tend to learn through their surroundings, experimenting and exploration. Adults may learn through background knowledge, experience, and exploration. A key relation in how learning occurs between all age groups is the ability to explore. When it comes to formal learning and how it occurs, I believe it begins with basics in a traditional environment. The learner is like a sponge that is ready to soak in information and begin their education experience. This experience is guided by their teacher. Whether this is a young child or and adult learner, every level of a course or curriculum is met with some standard expectation that the learner is working towards achieving to progress and receive recognition in understanding. How this is achieved is through reading and materials that are shared, reviewed, memorized and revisited usually in the structure of a test, research paper or essay, presentation, or some project. However, this is changing with the advent of the Internet and Web 2.0. Learning is occurring more because we are surrounded with an abundance of information that is easily accessible. Learning communities are creating environments of shared knowledge that can help engage those with similar interests to explore further.
While I am not particularly familiar with philosophies and theories of learning, I did find one article to help give a brief understanding. In the article, 5 things that educators should know about the philosophy of education, author Matthew Lynch shares the 3 main types of philosophies to be that of teacher-centered, student-centered and society-centered. Of the philosophies that are common within these types, I would be interested to subscribe to Essentialism, Humanism and Behaviorism. Essentialism is one that is teacher-centered and as described by Lynch, “It is the teaching of basic skills that have been proven over time to be needed in society.” Humanism is a student-centered philosophy that is focused on “fostering each student to his or her fullest potential.” Behaviorism is then a society-centered philosophy that “focuses on cultivating behaviors that are beneficial to society.” The blend of these three philosophies could help with the direction that is needed in educational environments, given the impacts of our technologically-driven and changing world. We need teachers to still maintain foundation and structure, and students that are desired to seek their full potential and to become lifelong learners. In addition, we need to create learning environments that harvest behaviors of a creative and respectable society that can benefit the future.
The role of the teacher in a learning environment can be best described as the knowledge holder. Their purpose is to then facilitate the learning process by providing the appropriate learning tools, resources, and expertise. Teachers in these learning environments, whether formal or informal are meant to engage the learners and help them to absorb and retain knowledge. The learners are there to receive, process and apply information into cognitive and comprehensive understanding. These roles can even be defined separately where in the traditional form of learning the teacher’s role is more direct and linear in the learning process. The teacher is meant to teach and the students to absorb within the bounds and limits of the requirements and standards that are set. What is changing in today’s world is that there are social learning environments that are shifting this concept into a shared learning where the teacher/facilitator becomes in part the learner, but also allows the learning to be explored more freely by the learners. In turn this is expanding the potential learning one can receive during the learning process.
In order for learning to occur, there must be a purpose or reason behind the need to learn. This could be informal. For example, wanting to learn how to ride a bike for fun or formal like wanting to become a surgeon. Sometimes the learning happens naturally and you may go about without even realizing it, but it happens because you did something you have never done. Taking the example of riding a bike. While the learning experience is different for each child, there are similarities in how we can define and say that there are visible signs of learning. In the case of riding a bike, we can say this occurs when they have learned first to ride with training wheels without the “teacher” holding on. Then proceeding to the next level of riding without training wheels. This shows the progression and level of learning achieved. Taking this into a formal environment, visible indicators become the ability to show or demonstrate understanding. This is usually shown in test scores or written/verbal presentations that suggest a level of understanding that have met or exceeded expectations. In the case of the surgeon, this includes completing several years of schooling and meeting a desired GPA, documented hours within an internship, and years and years of continuous experience and education beside someone that is already in that role. They will get to watch and assist in surgeries. Knowing that learning is occurring could then be seen in the cases they help with and how they handle them. These become their real moments to show what they know. No matter what the reason for learning may be, we must be able to approach the change needed in education with an open mind to reinvent how we can discover moments where learning is occurring outside of what is familiar.
A shift is occurring with today’s learning environments that necessitates a change in the approaches we take to learning because of technology. The role that technology has in learning in today’s world is progressively more influential in the process and how learning is occurring. Technology has created new ways of measuring success and progress for the individual learner and for a community of learners. Technology has broken down barriers and expanded the connections and reach that educators and learners can use to enhance the learning experience. It then becomes a matter of what we do with it next.
In case you missed the embedded link to the article referenced, please find the link to “5 things that educators should know about the philosophy of education” HERE.