Behaviorism is the main idea of module 9. This learning process is considered to be
focusing more on the behaviors of the student and the teacher controlling those
behaviors through the environment of the classroom. There are two different theories that explain
how learning occurs, classical conditioning and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning is about how a student
responds to a stimulus. So people have
certain stimulus’ that in turn make a response, but in classical conditioning a
stimulus is conditioned over a series of events which make a conditioned
response. An example is someone might be
scared of a certain slide because while it is fun at one point another student
pushed him down the slide when he was not ready so he was scared. Therefore the result is that the student is
scared of that slide. Operant
conditioning has to do with voluntary behaviors. This one is more apparent in a classroom
because it is easier to have students learn to settle down when the teacher
raises her hand or to take their seats whenever she is at the front board. This conditioning uses reinforcement and
punishment to do this. Reinforcement is
when you want the student to continue that behavior and punishment is when you
want them to stop that behavior. You can
do this by taking away something or giving something in return. There are many different ways in order for a
teacher to give positive reinforcement or any of the other strategies.
I was wondering if there is only
one way to handle a certain situation such as a form of positive reinforcement
instead of using negative reinforcement or does it just depend on the resources
available whether you are able to give something instead of taking something
away.
How does a behaviorist define learning?
A behaviorist defines learning as
by having a structured classroom with set rules. All the students will learn the same way
because they need to all have the same behavior as all the other students no
matter their differences. Behaviorists
do not believe that different students need a different type of learning strategy
because they do not look at students as individuals, but as a whole.
I really like how in your first section you start to list some topics, but then go into detail about how they would be used, showing that you understand their implications.
ReplyDeleteAs far as I know, there isn't a theoretical reason to use positive vs negative reinforcement, so I think, yes, it would depend on the situation and what seems most effective for your particular students.
Be careful in your behaviorist definition of learning. You have some interesting descriptions of a behaviorist classroom here, but what would they call learning? How could they tell it happened (hint: would behavior change?) I'm not entirely sure I understand that last piece. I think behaviorists could look at learning for an individual or a group--and it's more common they discuss an individual being reinforced or punished, and that one particular individual displaying a change in behavior.
What do you mean by not looking at students as individuals? This may be referring to how I mentioned in class that they believe learning a particular behavior is 'the same for all students'. By this, I meant that if one student is able to display the behavior of doing a cartwheel, it means they've learned it, and that goes for any student who can display the behavior of doing a cartwheel (it doesn't matter what's going on in their mind or how they conceptually learned it). I think it may be more helpful to just remember that behaviorists do not consider the mind at all, but just visible behaviors (and those may be individual or collective).