Learning Situation: Making Fried Chicken

A new chef is shown a picture of fried chicken. The Head chef describes all the characteristics of perfectly fried chicken and the ingredients used. The head chef provides the new chef with seasonings, flour, oil, a pot, and other tools used to make the chicken. The head chef demonstrates to the new chef how to properly clean and season the chicken. The new chef is encouraged to try and clean and season the chicken while the head chef provides constructive and positive feedback. After the new chef masters the task, the head chef then demonstrates how to dump the chicken in a bag of flour and shake it up so that all pieces are covered thoroughly with the flour. The new chef tries to do the same. The head chef then slowly drops the chicken in the hot pot of oil and prompts the new chef to do the same. The lesson continues with the new chef taking all the steps and repeating them alone, while the head chef only provides feedback.

1. Reception: A new chef is shown a picture of fried chicken. This grabs the readers attention.
2. Expectancy: The Head chef describes all the characteristics of perfectly fried chicken and the ingredients used. Learning objectives.
3. Procedural Knowledge: Occurs when the new chef is learning step by step.
4. Reinforce new knowledge: the head chef provides constructive and positive feedback
5. Assessing performance: the new chef taking all the steps and repeating them alone. The new chef has to recall the information previously given to complete the task.

Meaningful reception Theory: This theory suggests how teachers can best arrange the conditions that facilitate learning for students. Learning is better when you can relate the information being taught to something the student already knows. Meaningful reception takes place when new information is taken into a person’s existing mental structure and is related to previously learned information making a new connection. The use of advanced organizers is also very important.

9 Events of Instruction: These are 9 events that relate to an internal process. They are the following:

1. Reception (gain attention): gaining the attention of the audience. This alerts the audience that learning is about to take place.
2. Expectancy (inform learner of objectives): learning objectives – Informing the audience of about what they need to learn, why they are about to learn it, and what they will know at the end of the session.
3. Retrieval of prior knowledge (Stimulus recall of prerequisite skills): recalling any previously learned information and applying it to what the audience is about to learn.
4. Select perception (Present the stimulus): Presenting the new information to the audience.
5. Encode information (Provide learning guidelines): To help the audience learn and retain the information provide alternative approaches such as visual presentations, propositions, and numbers.
6. Respond to information (Elicit performance): some information will disappear so to ensure that the audience has learned they have to demonstrate their knowledge of what has been taught.
7. Reinforce new knowledge (Provide feedback): repeating, rehearsal, and giving feedback after the audience has proved their knowledge.
8. Retrieve stored information (Assess performance): Assessing performance by giving a test, essay, or quiz.
9. Generalize information to new situations (Enhance retention and transfer): Taking retained information and transferring it to a situation that is different from the one they have trained on.

Generative Learning: emphasizes the importance of connecting new experiences with what is already known. Learners construct meaning by generating relationships between stimuli and existing knowledge, beliefs, and personal experiences. Teachers can advance a students comprehension of new information by providing learning experiences that cause students to make these connections. The learner must also be an active participant in the learning process.

The theorists that will be discussed are Edward C. Tolman, Jean Piaget, and Gestalt.

Tolman’s Contributions to the cognitivism theory:

• Learning is an internal rather than external change and that learning isn’t reflected in an organism’s behavior.
• Behavior is purposive. Once someone has learned that a behavior leads to a certain end result, the person behaves in a way to achieve that specific result.
• Learning can occur without reinforcement.
• Learning results in an organized body of information.
  • Cognitive maps: a mental representation of the layout of one’s environment.

This is the procedure that deals with Tolman’s maze.

Procedure:In their study 3 groups of rats had to find their way around a complex maze. At the end of the maze there was a food box. Some groups of rats got to eat the food, some did not.

Group 1: Rewarded

• Day 1 – 17: Every time they got to end, given food (i.e. reinforced).

Group 2: Delayed Reward

• Day 1 – 10: Every time they got to end, taken out.
• Day 11 -17: Every time they got to end, given food (i.e. reinforced).

Group 3: No reward

• Day 1 – 17: Every time they got to end, taken out.

 

Piaget Contributions to the cognitivism theory:

• Suggested that mental events such as logical reasoning processes, structure of knowledge, developmental stages that were incompatible with behaviorist theories.
• Interaction with the physical environment is critical for learning and cognitive development.
• Interaction with other people is equally critical for learning and development.
• Relating prior knowledge to the material to be learned.
• People are intrinsically motivated to make sense of the world
• People adapt to their environment through the process of assimilation and accommodation.
• Cognitive development occurs in stages controlled by maturity.
  • Sensorimotor Stage (Birth to age 2)
  • Preoperational Stage (Age 2 to 6 or 7)
  • Concrete Operations Stage (Age 6 or 7 to 11 or 12)
  • Formal Operations Stage (Age 11 or 12 to Adulthood)

 

Gestalt Contributions to the cognitivism Theory:

• Perception is different from reality
• The whole is more than the sum of its parts.
• Human experiences cannot be successfully understood if different aspects of experience are studied separately.
• Learning involves formation of memory traces, where overtime these traces become simpler, more concise, and more complex than then actually input.
• Experiences are structured and organized to create a whole.
• Experiences are organized in specific ways

Cognitivism is another learning theory.

• This theory states that learning is a relatively permanent change in mental representations or associations due to experience.
• It involves the building of connections in schema through the processes of assimilation and accommodation.

Key principles

1. Mental events are centrally involved in human learning.
2. Learning is a process of relating new material to previously learned information.
3. Knowledge is organized and learners are actively involved in the learning process.
4. Some learning processes are unique to human beings only
5. Learning may be shown by a change in behavior but learning can happen without behavioral change.
6. Cognitive processes(mental processes) are the focus of study.

Important Vocabulary

• Schema: a mental framework or concept that helps organize and interpret information; basic structure of human knowledge.
• Assimilation: fitting new information into existing schemas.
• Accommodation: information you already have has to be modified to take in the new information.
• Memory: Ability to recall information that was previously acquired.
• Encoding: modifying information that is being stored in memory so that it is easier to recall.
• Sensory Registration: refers to the first form of memory humans have. The sensory register takes in information through the five senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch) and holds it for no more than a few seconds. This allows you to remember the information.
• Short-Term/Working Memory: first processing point for new information after sensory reception. Usually processed for less than one minute.
• Long-Term Memory: Information processed for more than 1 minute.
• Storage: Process of putting new information in memory.
• Retrieval: Process by which people find information previously acquired for use.
• Dual Storage Model: storage system of human memory that includes registry, short-term memory, long-term memory, retrieval, and control mechanisms.
• Episodic Memory: memory of one’s own personal life experiences.
• Declarative Knowledge: knowledge of how things were or are.
• Law of Similarity: similar things tend to appear grouped together.

“Behaviorism.” Funderstanding Education Curriculum and Learning Resources. Web. 1 Nov. 2014.

Koszalka,Tiffany. IDE 621 Principles of Instruction and learning. 2014.

Ormrod, Jeanne Ellis. Human Learning. 6th ed. Pearson, 2012. Print.

 

 

 

• When I first began to learn about this theory I wasn’t sure if it truly made sense to me.
• I think a lot of my teachers when I was growing up taught using this theory. When we got into the reinforcement side of the theory it really stood out to me. I can remember especially in elementary school, a lot of my teachers using positive reinforcement like giving out stickers or candy for getting the right answer and it really increased the students responses.
• The class activities where we had to fill out the behaviorism booklet and describing the three different learning situations using the behavioral learning theory principles really helped me understand the theory better.
• The behaviorism learning theory has changed my idea on learning because it is based on of the changes in behavioral observations to know whether or not a person has actually learned something. I think that makes this theory a little more believable than other learning theories.

Observation Checklist	Yes/no
Instructor communicates terminal behaviors (objectives)	yes
Instruction presented in small steps- does shaping and chaining occur?	yes
Behaviors mastered before moving on to the next task	yes
Instructor uses negative reinforcement	no
Instructor uses positive feedback	yes

 

Learning Situation: Making Fried Chicken

A new chef is shown a picture of fried chicken. The Head chef describes all the characteristics of perfectly fried chicken and the ingredients used. The head chef provides the new chef with seasonings, flour, oil, a pot, and other tools used to make the chicken. The head chef demonstrates to the new chef how to properly clean and season the chicken. The new chef is encouraged to try and clean and season the chicken while the head chef provides constructive and positive feedback. After the new chef masters the task, the head chef then demonstrates how to dump the chicken in a bag of flour and shake it up so that all pieces are covered thoroughly with the flour. The new chef tries to do the same. The head chef then slowly drops the chicken in the hot pot of oil and prompts the new chef to do the same. The lesson continues with the new chef taking all the steps and repeating them alone, while the head chef only provides feedback.

1. Objective: The picture of fried chicken
2. Stimulus: The head chef demonstrates to the new chef how to properly clean and season the chicken.
3. Response: The new chef is encouraged to try and clean and season the chicken
4. Positive Reinforcement: The head chef provides constructive and positive feedback.
5. Shaping: Shaping occurs as the head chef is teaching the new chef step by step how to make the chicken.
6. Chaining: The new chef taking all the steps and repeating them alone.

Here are three instructional theories that I have decided to talk about.

Programmed Instruction: a step by step teaching method that is monitored continuously giving small units of information at a time. The material is learned through a sequence of segments, where the first segment gives a new unit of information and asks a question about it. After the student replies to the question, they move on to the next segment, where they are provided with the correct answer. Then the segment presents new information and asks another question and this is continued through the segments. It is self-paced and provides the student with immediate reward or reinforcement.

Mastery Learning: is learning where the instructor requires the students to learn and actually master the material before moving on to the next lesson. Mastery Learning is consistent with shaping. Students move through the material at their own pace or as a whole class. Before continuing to the next lesson students must show that they have mastered the material usually done by taking a test or quiz.

Computer-Based Instruction: is instruction that is presented on a computer. This type of instruction provides immediate feedback and doesn’t allow the student to continue to practice wrong skills. It also helps improve student attitudes toward schoolwork and can sometimes lead to higher academic achievements.

The theorists that will be discussed are Ivan Pavlov, B.F. Skinner, and Clark Hull. These theorist all had different branches in the study of behavioral learning.

Pavlov is known for Classical Conditioning.

• Classical conditioning is a learning process that suggests that pairing a neutral stimulus and an unconditioned stimulus together will produce a new learned response.
• The neutral stimulus does not produce a response until it is paired with the unconditioned stimulus, but the unconditioned stimulus naturally produces a response on its own.
• When the neutral stimulus pairs up with the unconditioned stimulus they create a conditioned stimulus and then a response is created.
• The more frequently the stimulus and response is paired with each other the stronger the stimulus response habit will be.

Skinner is known for Operant Conditioning.

• Operant conditioning  is a learning process that suggests that learning is the result of a behavior being reinforced.
• A response that is followed by a reinforcer is strengthened and is more likely to reoccur.
• A reinforcer is a stimulus or event that increases the regularity of a response.
• There are two types of reinforcement
  1. Positive Reinforcement- increase response by presenting a stimulus after the response. Can be materialistic, social, activity, positive feedback, or an internal feeling.
  2. Negative Reinforcement- increases response through the removal of stimuli. This is usually unpleasant.
• There are two types of punishment
  1. Punishment 1 (positive punishment) – decrease of a response based on presenting negative stimuli.
  2. Punishment 2 (negative punishment) – removing pleasant stimuli after a response.
• There are three important conditions to operant conditioning
  1. Reinforcement must follow the responses.
  2. Reinforcement must follow the response immediately.
  3. Applying reinforcement must be consistent.

Hull is known for Intervening Variables.

• Intervening variables describes a variable that mediates the relationship between a stimulus and response.
• Hull suggested that the stimulus-response connection depends on both the kind and the amount of reinforcement.
• Habits are stimulus-response connections based on reward.
• According to Hull, responses participate in habit formation, where the process is progressive, and reward is an crucial condition.
• He also suggested that learning occurred when reinforcement of behaviors resulted in meeting some type of survival need.