- An example from my life of when you were taught using each method described in this article: behaviorism, cognitivism, and constructivism.
- Share a story about your best learning experience and why did I enjoy it?
A learning experience that benefited my knowledge was the “Introduction to Systems Analysis” course (CSC 375). The class was structured around the completion of a large group comprised of various smaller components that would serve as learning and application opportunities for the units covered. The aspects of the course that I enjoyed are;
- The requirement for me (the learner) to construct my understanding and knowledge through reflections on the lectures and additional experiences. For instance, the project required our group to use new and known concepts, and actively apply and engage them to the deliverables.
- Activity practicing other skills that led to an optimal learning experience. For example, effective planning, documenting, research, troubleshooting and overall management of the project and its team members. Upon reflecting on the methods and strategies that I employed during this project, there was a significant use of constructivism and cognitivism learning theories.
However, one issue that occurred in this learning experience was a lack of constructive reinforcement in my learning. I recognize that this is a critical component of the translation of knowledge into my memory. Thankfully, the high engagement with the course concepts allowed me to still learn adequately. Personally, a more detailed and reflective approach of reinforcement provided by the professor and teaching assistant would have identified the weaker points of my knowledge application to be improved. Receiving a number or letter grade still provided me with a form of reinforcement. Put this up for interpretation of what is considered a high or low grade, which leaves room for plateaued knowledge growth. Therefore the course instructor offered a low experience of behaviorist principles.
Despite this, the course itself was a great learning experience and I enjoyed it. By putting us in a hypothetical scenario of creating and working on a business idea for the project. It also required us to use project management skills to manage our project efficiently. This not only increased my knowledge but also gave me numerous opportunities to apply the learnings of the course as well as my other previous sources of knowledge.
My Comments on Peers Posts
Hi Melody, I enjoyed reading your post!
You make strong personal connections to the behaviourist ideas and approaches! I also find myself using some of these in my work and learning methods meaning that we both have similar learning needs.
Something that you highlighted that I think is crucial: is the importance of pre-assessments of tasks to determine the team’s understanding. As well as reviewing your own understanding and knowledge. This is something that I should practice more often. Instead, of jumping into the task ensure to establish and confirm a base understanding of what you already know and new things you might need to learn to complete the task successfully. Additionally, this helps with less backtracking and prevents getting overwhelmed in not knowing where or how to approach the task.
https://melhung.opened.ca/blog-1/
Hi Sashi!
These are all great examples of each learning process method. I love using mind maps to help me understand how the different topics and ideas connect, relate and depend on each other. I think that it bridges knowledge pathways together. Additionally, I found the constructivist approach in CSC 375 to be very valuable to my learning as well. As mentioned in my post, putting students in a realistic world and/or career scenarios and applying previous knowledge/experiences to complete the project helps strengthen our comprehension and skills used to do so.
https://sashi.opened.ca/category/edci335/