Module 4: What is Learning?

The three chapters for this weeks module dealt specifically with the theories of learning.  There are three points, all of which deal, with the well-rounded teacher as well as the well-educated student.

First is the importance of the acquisition and development as critical thinking skills (p. 343).  These are the skills which allow all persons to examine claims and evidence critically to turn them over in their minds, and determine whether or not these ideas have merit.  These skills are those which students will use most frequently in their daily lives. Beyond the mere facts of learning, critical thinking teaches a student how to think rather than simply what to think.  I found this to be most interesting because it is this skill which I feel quite often lacking in modern education systems.  If students were to graduate with perfect grades, but did not acquire these skills, their eductaion would be almost useless.  Rarely are situations in the real world as neat and tidy as the problems which students will face in examination while in school.

Coupled with the development of critical thinking skills is the process of overlearning (p.348).  That is, learning a skill beyond the point of mastery.  Just as critical thinking skills provide the logical background for all critical assessment which people will perform throughout their lives, overlearning aids in this by permitting a student to move beyond a mere recall of facts.  By knowing the factual events of a historical event beyond perfect recall, students move beyond the what and can begin to ask how and why such events occurred.

Finally,  an interesting piece of evidence which caught my eye was the claim that the more a student provides well-though explanations within a small group of other students, the  more student explaining learns about the subject (p. 376).  I thinks this reflects the collaborative nature of education, not jsut from student to student, but between student and teacher. By pondering explanations to serious questions, both the student and the teacher must think critically about these questions, so that they may arrive at the truth.