Behavior Learning Theory

Behaviorism is an approach to psychology based on the proposition that behavior can be researched scientifically without recourse to inner mental states. All species of animals learn in similar ways by using same guiding principles, to understand the learning processes, they focus on the stimulus and the responses. The behavior is determined by the environment either through association or reinforcement.

Behaviorism assumes a learner is essentially passive responding to environmental stimuli. The learner starts as a clean slate and behavior is shaped through positive reinforcement or negative reinforcement. Both positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement increases the probability that the antecedent behavior will happen again. In contrast, punishment (both positive and negative) decreases the likelihood that the antecedent behavior will happen again. Positive indicates the application of a stimulus; negative indicates the withholding of a stimulus. Learning is therefore defined as a change in behavior in the learner.

In 20th century, with in some psychologists, behaviorist school of thought ran concurrently. Its main influences were Ivan Pavlov, who investigated classical conditioning, John B Watson (1878-1958) who rejected introspective methods and sought to restrict psychology to experimental laboratory methods, B.F. Skinner, sought to give ethical grounding to behaviorism.
 There are two types of learning theories
Classical conditioning: addresses learning of involuntary responses, for example when the sound of the bell alone stimulates saliva flow in dogs.
    Operant conditioning: addresses learning of voluntary responses.

Behavior is categorized between Antecedents and consequences. Antecedents are stimulus that comes before the behavior. Antecedent behavior or cues tell people what behavior will be reinforced and Discrimination is the use of cues, signals or information to know when behavior is likely to be reinforced-learning is largely a matter of mastering more and more complex discrimination.
Whereas consequences are stimulus that comes after a behavior, two main consequences include reinforcements and punishments. Reinforcements include positive and negative reinforcements, for example in positive reinforcement, a reward or something desirable is given. And in negative reinforcement, escapes or something undesirable is avoided.
Punishments include presentation and removal punishments, for example in presentation punishment, an undesirable stimulus is given and in removal punishment, a desirable is lost or removed.


References


Culatta, R. (2011 ). Behaviorist Learning Theory. Retrieved March 3, 2013, from Innovative Learning: http://www.innovativelearning.com/teaching/behaviorism.html
Slavin. (R.E (2003)). Educational Psychology: Theory and Practice (7th Edition ed.).













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Introduction to pedagogy and learning theories

Theoretical perspective in teaching and learning: An overview


Pedagogy is the art, science or profession of teaching, theword pedagogy is originated from Greek word “Paidagogos”, which “paid” is translated as child and “agogos” is translated as leader (slave who took child to school). Also pedagogy can be defined as exploration of effective teaching and learning theories.

Using pedagogy in learning sessions a teacher can bring the ability of creativity and imagination, which influences a group of learners to focus, retain and maintain their attention, imagination and creativity on the learning contents. Moreover this influence the learners desire to investigate, discover, discuss and reflect on their findings.Most forms of formal teaching uses pedagogy in several ways, whether knowing it or not. It’s true that teachers create lesson plans before the lessons and always enters the classroom with theories or ideas on how to teach best, they decide the material to be used and these principles underlies to inform their actions and subject in teaching settings.

The modern societies has created various number of arguments on what learning theory to be used when expanding the education to almost all the people, what subjects should be taught, and how teachers should behave in front of the students to instruct them. Most of the teachers now days have clear sense of idea what their pedagogy are, believing the theories which are the most accurate and relevant to the purpose as actions in a class focuses through learning and practice. 

A teacher always has a pedagogy, which is clearly defined or not, but it’s worth enough to define the pedagogy, because producing different types of teaching and learning with more conscious sense of underlying methods will help the instructors to refine these methods to be more effective in their work.Sometimes teachers are advised to cover certain materials based on country and state of standards.ie National curriculum framework. These are the standards students should achieve during their educational process (mentally, physically, and spiritually). In order achieve these pedagogical ideas are used to select, choose the most important subjects for children to learn. 

In this article I will highlight on the most common learning theories used by teachers and how pedagogy is used in these theories.The theories are behaviorism, constructivism, cognitive theory, motivational theory and social stimulated theory, etc.

Behaviorism mainly focuses on the behavior modification through stimulus-response pairs with trial and error learning, as learning is done through association and reinforcement. In this theory pedagogical focus is on control and adaptive responses which focuses on observable outcomes.

Cognitive theory focuses on internal cognitive structures which views learning as transformations of these cognitive structures through human development. In this theory the pedagogical focus is on the processing and transmission of information through communication, explanation, recombination, contrast, inference and problem solving. Also this theory allows designing the sequences of conceptual material which builds on existing information structures.

Constructivism focuses on the process, which learners build their own mental structures while interacting with an environment. In this theory, the pedagogical focus is task oriented as it favors hands-on, self-directed activities oriented towards design and discovery. Mostly this theory is useful for structured learning environments which constructs conceptual structures through engagement in self-directed tasks.

Social situated learning theory takes social interactions as important and learning as a social participation as it emphasis on interpersonal relationships involving imitation and modeling. Also it uses language as a tool for learning, which has the functionality as a communicative or cultural tool used for sharing and jointly developing knowledge, and also has the functionality as a psychological tool for organizing our individual thoughts, for reasoning, planning and reviewing our actions.



References

Jephias Mapuva, J. S. (2010, December). Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts: . Retrieved February 27, 2013, from http://www.itdl.org/Journal/Dec_10/article01.htm
Rusbult, C. (2007). Teaching Strategies for Effective Instruction. Retrieved February 28, 2013, from http://www.asa3.org/ASA/education/teach/active.htm
what is pedagogy? (2012). Retrieved February 26, 2013, from infed: http://www.infed.org/whatis/what_is_pedagogy.html
Woolfolk, A. (2004). Educational Psychology. Pearson Education,Inc.


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