Philosophy Statement Education Research Coursework

Personal Philosophy Statement
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Personal Philosophy Statement
Definition of Learning
According to the cognitive view of learning, individuals get knowledge through information processing involving the brain, language, and thoughts. In this case, once an individual identifies a sensory stimulus, the brain triggers a process of identifying and registering the stimuli (Information Processing Theory). After this, the brain can thereafter transfer the information to short-term memory or long-term memory. On the other hand, behaviorism refers to the concept of classical conditioning, whereby the relationship between two types of stimuli is used to create a pattern of learning. Therefore, when a particular behavior is repeated over time, the individual learns to produce a conditioned stimulus as a result (Foundations of Behaviourism). This reinforces a specific action or pattern that can be simply recognized. Lastly, according to the situated learning concept, the process of gaining knowledge refers to the ability to differentiate perceptions from the action (History of Educational Psychology). In this case, the brain acts as a tool to identify phenomena occurring around the body and classify them accordingly. These definitions thus offer various perspectives on the learning process in accordance to their proponents studies and understanding of the concept.
My definition of learning encompasses ideas from the above concepts. Firstly, learning is a process that involves acquiring new information, skills, and perceptions from the environment (Social Constructivism and Social Learning Theory). As a result, the process of getting such information into the brain requires personal experiences, advice, or teachings from other parties or a personal initiative to study. While some learning involves immediate understanding, others take a longer time to grasp properly. For instance, touching a burning flame elicits a quick reaction, and the individual can then associate pain with fire. However, concepts of physics take longer to understand in most individuals due to their complexity. These processes thus work together to produce a knowledgeable individual over time through the slow and fast learning processes.
Description of How People Learn
From a young age, people learn from social cognition by imitating or modeling the actions or behaviors of others. This is evident in babies and toddlers who learn to speak by copying their primary caregivers. As individuals grow, they tend to look for role models whose success in different life aspects can be mirrored into them. Bandura supported this idea by studying how human beings frequently used observations as a primary learning tool (Social Constructivism and Social Learning Theory). In his research, he noted that social interactions in human beings are a source of learning, with each individual having the ability to choose their path based on the available information. In this case, the modeling process involves the usage of attention, retention, reinforcement, and feedback (Social Constructivism and Social Learning Theory). This cycle paves the way for individuals to identify a viable learning activity,...