Now that you mention it…….

            I have never been one to think of how I learn.  It was always something that just happened like the sun rising and setting; the instructor teaches and I digest and retain what I can.   Never before had I heard of “schools of learning” (Ally, 2008), and now that I have been introduced to them I cannot stop thinking about them.  I am now second-guessing if I am a constructivist.  Is it possible to fall under two or possibly all of the schools of learning in some form or another?  Surely, one can move from one school to another, but is it possible to be both a constructivist and a cognitive learner? 

           

            Having had to classify myself (as a constructivist), I was still drawn to the other two options offered in the Ally article.  The Behaviorists asking ‘what’; I can see this in my 5 year old daughter asking ‘what makes the light in the refrigerator come on’ when she opens the door and her asking ‘what makes stars fall’.  The Cognitive learners asking ‘how’; I can see this in my 11-year-old son when he is working through a challenging math problem (such as 3X+5X=56) trying to figure out how the answer is what it is.  And in myself I see the constructivist asking ‘why’; asking myself as I read ‘why is this important to the class’.

            So how has this and how will it contribute to my distance education (if I was asking how, would I then be classified as a cognitive learner?), I believe that it will make me more aware of what I am reading, process the information in a more personal manner while making the personal connection to help store it in my memory.  What I have learned is that perhaps we travel through the different schools of learning as we age and progress through our education.  The most beneficial way, I feel to capitalize on this information is to remember that not everyone learns in the same manner and that it is possible for certain age groups to benefit from being taught differently than others. 

            I certainly hope that as students in this course we are presented with more information such as this to keep us thinking and reflecting more deeply.  

February 8, 2011