QUESTION

Part A:
Understanding students learning: Interviewing 3 university students asking them about their learning experience. write a report of 2000 words refering to Ramsden, P. book (2003) “Learning to teach in higher education” chap 3-5. Taking into account your understanding of student’s approaches to learning ; conceptions of learning; and factors affecting their approach.

Part B:
Refering to Brroksfield, S. book (1995) “Becoming critically reflecting teacher” chap 2, discuss how Brooksfield’s notion of four lenses has added to, or challenged the way you reflect on and make sense of your own teaching and learning practice with reference to the following contexts:
– Interviewing students about their learning (student lens)
– The reading you’veengaged with so far (theorethical lens)
– Engaging in discussion with colleagues (peer lens)
Reflecting on your own experiense as both student and teacher

SOLUTION

Part 1:

Knowledge: Knowledge refers to the ability to perform a task, executing a function and to be able to distinctive think and describe about different things. This approach was given by Bruning, Schraw and Ronning (1995:96) which divided the knowledge into three different types namely Declarative knowledge which means the knowledge about facts, Procedural knowledge which means skills to perform tasks and executing functions, Metacognitive knowledge which is a higher class of knowledge which enables to examine how humans think and behave. The study of nature of knowledge is called epistemology and also includes domain knowledge which is specific about a subject intended to be specific according to an individual.

Teaching: Teaching as in the conventional language is the art of making the other person understand but is not just limited to the bookish knowledge of making the learner lean by the teacher. Teaching is much more than that is comprised of the activities which will encompass the role of teacher being a mediator for the learner to acquire factual and skill knowledge along with helping them get the cognitive skills for problems solving. But even this definition does not suffice for teaching as the role of teacher is much more than just said above and will eventually comprise of three major activities including planning, interaction, and evaluation.

LEARNING THEORIES: The four theories of learning have been discussed in the below paragraphs namely: Behaviourism, Gestalt theory, Cognitivism and Constructivism.

Behaviourism: This theory of learning has its origin in the Darwin’s theory of survival for the fittest and hence according to this theory the living beings learn throughout their life and the organisms or animals which are better learners will be able to succeed in their survival battle and hence they will be able to get their knowledge transformed into the useful meanings of survival. This theory takes into account that the participant learns through a passive mode also and is a leaner throughout life. This theory also has certain criticism factors against it and includes the passive mode learning capability of a participant which is usually unpractical since the learner is always in the active mode whenever he is learning. Also the learning capability of young children for a new language cannot be explained by this principle.

Gestalt Theory: This theory takes into account the fact that knowledge is not perceived in pieces and rather been understood as a whole, which means that the parts of particular topic are not just understood as a part and rather been taken as a whole and are liked to each other so as to understand the whole concept. This basically points out the things that the knowledge is taken and grasped for the purpose of problems solving which can be solved if the whole part of the knowledge is taken up by the brains and not just parts of it. This theory also states that the knowledge is grouped into elements of following principles namely proximity, similarity/differentiation, closure and simplicity. Gestalt theory postulates that knowledge is grouped into elements according to the following principles: proximity, similarity/differentiation, closure and simplicity. According to this theory proximity means that people usually have a tendency to group elements according to their closeness to one another and their patterns of formation, similarity means that the person tend to put the similar items together and the different ones in different places, closure means that if the elements have a property to complete each other then we usually put them together, and simplicity means that the adequate and stronger patterns of the elements dominates the weaker ones.

Cognitivism: This theory also take the fact into account that the knowledge is absolute and given by the nature to the individual and hence it sees the knowledge in the same way as that of behaviorist way. Hence some of the philosophers classify this in the same way as the behaviorism is classified and this theory puts the arguments forth that the knowledge is given and not been perceived or received which means that the knowledge is taken by the individual from the nature by various processes of it and it cannot be actively taken by the person unless it is been otherwise. Hence the two theories takes a close relationship with each other and this fact takes into account of their citations together in various philosophies of knowledge.

Constructivism: This theory contradicts to the above mentioned theory and puts the argument forth that the knowledge is perceived by the individual by his experiences in the world and by reflecting on his/her experiences which basically means that the knowledge is taken by the individual differently based on different experiences in life and hence the person construct his own way of understanding things based on his past experiences and this may be in parts too.

FACTORS AFFECTING LEARNING:

The factors which are crucial in the process of learning and are important to be considered while the learning process is evaluated are:

• Intelligence: This is important factor to be contributing to the process of learning and should be considered from both the perspectives of the teacher as well as of the student as the teacher will have to be intelligent enough to make the students understand what he intends to. And the student has to be intelligent to learn what is intended for him to learn and this is the factor which affects the process of learning since the students are more intelligent will learn faster as compared to the students who have a low intelligence level and thus affecting the overall progress of learning and teaching.
• Aptitude: This is another important factor which needs to be considered in order to evaluate the learning process and to evaluate the abilities and capabilities of the teacher. The student needs to have enough level of aptitude for the subject matter as the students who don’t have the required level of aptitude will ultimately will not be able to learn and understand at the same pace as that of the other students and hence will have a poor performance. This is why the entrance examinations in most of the universities are applied to test the level of aptitude in the students who intend to pursue a particular carrier or subject in the university.
• Goals: Goals are another set of factors which affects the process of learning as they will contribute to the student’s performance since every student would like to pursue and learn the subjects which are in his/her goal lists. For example a student who wishes to go towards the surgery division in the post graduation would learn the surgery subject better in the medicine undergraduate degree course. Hence personal goals of the students are important factor to be considered while evaluating the performance of learning of the student.
• Interests: Interest of the student in the subject and in the teaching is another necessary consideration in the learning process as the student who have more interest in the subject will learn better and factor as compared to the students who does not have the interest in the subject. This factor is an important contributor to the learning process as the interest of the student as well as of the teacher are important to be considered, since the students who do have the interest in the subject will learn faster and better as compared to the students who do not have the interest, in spite of the difficulties and barriers in the process of learning, and hence an interest in the learning process and the subject is important for the student and the teacher.
• Readiness & Maturation: The level of maturation is something which will affect the learning process but to a comparatively lower pitch, as they will contribute in the raising or degrading of other factors as goals and interests in the subject. The student may not be matured enough or ready to learn the particular subject or he may be ready to learn a subject which is not in his course material but makes him the interest required to. Thus the readiness for learning a subject and the maturation to understand the same is required in the student and hence important in the learning process.
• Motivation: The motivation process is important for the learning process and needs to be considered by the teacher as the student who is not ready to learn or is incapable to learn because of various contributing factors may be learning at a better pace if motivated and hence the motivation is a process which will increase the levels of other important factors as stated above in the student and hence makes him learn better. This is also important and necessary for the good performing students as the increase in motivation will lead to increased leaning capacity and hence better performance of the student.
• Self Concept: Another important factor in the process of learning is the procedure of self concept as the student learn and memorize the concepts by understanding them in their own different ways and this important for them to be able to grasp the context of the topic. Now this self concept process may be varied among different students and hence will be affecting the students at different levels as the student who has a better process to make themselves understand will be able to perform better and the students who have a weak process of self concept clarification will be slow learners.
• Attitudes & Values: Now a student may learn a concept very easily just because his value and attitude is according to the concept and hence he will be able to learn it faster as the concept is half way cleared in his mind because of the fact that his attitude or his values are same as that of the new concept or topic which he is learning. In contrast the student who has a different attitude and values as compared to the subject which he is trying to learn, then he may take more time and may not even understand few parts of it just because his values will not allow him to take the concept as a reality and will counter fight in his brains.
• Level of Aspiration: The level of aspiration in a student will affect the process of learning as the student who has a higher aspiration will learn better and faster as compare to those who have a low level of aspiration. Hence the aspirations of the student contribute towards the learning process of the student and at the same time the students who have a different aspiration may learn different to other students and their learning process may be low or high just because of the aspiration levels in his brains for the goals to be attained ultimately. This holds true for the student who are better performers and the students who are weak performers because of a different goal setting and aspiration level.
• Learning style: This factor is very important and crucial to the learning process as the students may have different learning style and different process of learning since the student will be from different cultures and different life styles with different brains and hence the learning style will ultimately affect the leaning outcome. Hence the students must be encouraged to the right learning style and should be corrected if they had acquired a different learning style which is inappropriate for the concept or subject intended to be learnt by the student.
• Socio cultural determinants: These are the factors which contribute towards the learning process by the different cultures and values of the student which they inherit from their way of upbringing, their parents, their friends and the country they belong to. Hence the socio cultural differences may be very important for the learning process and they may be contributing with a high pitch towards the learning process as the students will learn the concepts better and factor which are according to their cultural value and hence will impact the learning process of the student.

Part 2:

Brookfield’s notion of four lenses has added to, or challenged the way you reflect on and make sense of your own teaching and learning practice

– Interviewing students about their learning (student lens)

The principles laid in the Brookfield’s notion of student lens have positively influenced my behavior as a teacher and as a student. As a teacher the lens had made me learn that the students make certain perceptions in their mind about the teacher which they carry till the end of their life and as long as they will remember the teacher. The student tend to take the casual comments as serious which may sometimes put unknowingly in front of the class and may just contradict the same at a later part of the lecture or consecutive lecture. This kind of instances and things had been taken seriously by the students and I as a teacher encourage the student to speak freely in my class so that they will point out my negatives which I will be able to improve in the later stages of my lecture. This will help me improve my performance and as human being which is very important as a teacher, and this is provided and guided by learning and understanding the student lens of the Brookfield’s theory which makes me give anonymity in the class so that the students have the easy access to solution to their problems and give me a chance to serve them better. As a student the student lens has helped me in understanding the fact that teachers don’t really mean something which they say in a discussion with a casual intension and should not be taken seriously unless been otherwise pointed out by the teacher to make note of.

– The reading you’ve engaged with so far (theoretical lens)

The principle of theoretical lens in the Brookfield’s notion of four lenses had helped me both as a teacher and as a student that the explanation to different activities and results in the classroom do exist and are not only dependent on the teacher. As a teacher I was able to get the explanation for the activities happening in my class including the hostility of some students, the decreased results and varied learning patterns among the students and lot more other factors were answered by the theoretical lens. This lens help me explain myself that as a teacher I am not the only one which is responsible for the negative culture in the class and poor performance of some students which may be caused by various factors including the family up brings, values and cultural differences and thus saved me from the guilt of being solely responsible for the bad performance of my students and the class’ environment. As a student the lens has helped me understand that the students play a vital role in the overall environment of the class and the teacher is not the only one responsible for maintaining a neutral and positive environment in the class. Thus this helped me improve my performance by taking the factors into account which were responsible for bad performance and decreased enthusiasm of the students and teachers in the class and helped me bring the same to the normal levels so that the students and teachers both can be benefitted out of it.

– Engaging in discussion with colleagues (peer lens)

The peer lens has helped me both as a teacher and a student, in the fact that the colleagues serve as a useful mean to get the feedback and to improve on the same and this makes us to discuss important factors about teaching and teaching experiences to be discussed among ourselves as classmates and colleagues. The feedback from my colleagues has made me to improve my performance as a teacher which was way lower than after the feedback and upgrading the lower set of rules been placed in the ground of teaching. The discussion with the colleagues has helped us all to get the solution of our daily problems as a teacher and het the solution and alternative ways for the same, making it a way better environment for both the students and teachers in the classroom. As a student the peer lens has helped us improve our performance and learn from the mistakes of each other as we tend to learn easily from each other’s mistakes and take the points into consideration which were invisible to ourselves about our own performance. This kind of discussion proved to be fruitful and healthy to both the students and the teacher and ultimately helping both the perspectives of the teaching. This was very important from the point that the discussion will show the ways to do things which were easily completed by one student or teacher and was lacking in the other and thus the best practices were shared among the group which makes it a healthy competition for the group and makes them compete with improved performance.

– Reflecting on your own experience as both student and teacher (autobiographical lens)

The autobiographical lens has a dual meaning when I am a teacher as well a student as this lens will work both ways simultaneously to learn in the class and reflect the similar pattern as a teacher in the class. The autobiographical lens basically talks about learning from our past experiences as a leaner or student and present the similar ways of teaching to our students so that they will be able to learn better. This has a better meaning when said that the learning experiences as a student are better expressed and recorded for the expression on your own students at a later stage in life which will be in the type narration of learning days and hence describing them the techniques which you use to follow and practice and thus preventing them from the dilemma of different ways of learning. This has a higher importance when you are a student at the same time and a teacher as well as you will be able to describe the fresh memories to your students about your learning experiences and the same had happened with me, which made me to improve my performance as a teacher as well as a student. Thus the autobiographical lens has  a huge impact on the learning patterns which are been followed among the students and thus helping them improve on each aspect of the learning along with making them equipped with the techniques to learn faster and perform better in the modern world of competition.

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