DALE'S CONE EXPERIENCES

What is Dale’s Cone of Experience?

The Cone was originally developed by Edgar Dale in 1946 and was intended as a way to describe various learning experiences. The diagram presented to the right (Raymond S. Pastore, Ph.D) is a modification of Dale’s original Cone; the percentages given relate to how much people remember and is a recent modification. Essentially, the Cone shows the progression of experiences from the most concrete (at the bottom of the cone) to the most abstract (at the top of the cone). It is important to note that Dale never intended the Cone to depict a value judgment of experiences; in other words, his argument was not that more concrete experiences were better than more abstract ones. Dale believed that any and all of the approaches could and should be used, depending on the needs of the learner.

Behaviorism

Behaviorism was a movement in psychology and philosophy that emphasized the outward behavioral aspects of thought and dismissed the inward experiential, and sometimes the inner procedural, aspects as well; a movement harking back to the methodological proposals of John B. Watson, who coined the name.  Watson’s 1912 manifesto proposed abandoning Introspectionist attempts to make consciousness a subject of experimental investigation to focus instead on behavioral manifestations of intelligence.  B. F. Skinner later hardened behaviorist strictures to exclude inner physiological processes along with inward experiences as items of legitimate psychological concern.  Consequently, the successful “cognitive revolution” of the nineteen sixties styled itself a revolt against behaviorism even though the computational processes cognitivism hypothesized would be public and objective — not the sort of private subjective processes Watson banned.  Consequently (and ironically), would-be-scientific champions of consciousness now indict cognitivism for its “behavioristic” neglect of inward experience.
The enduring philosophical interest of behaviorism concerns this methodological challenge to the scientific bona fides of consciousness (on behalf of empiricism) and, connectedly (in accord with materialism), its challenge to the supposed metaphysical inwardness, or subjectivity, of thought.  Although behaviorism as an avowed movement may have few remaining advocates, various practices and trends in psychology and philosophy may still usefully be styled “behavioristic”. As long as experimental rigor in psychology is held to require “operationalization” of variables, behaviorism’s methodological mark remains.  Recent attempts to revive doctrines of “ontological subjectivity” (Searle 1992) in philosophy and bring “consciousness research” under the aegis of Cognitive Science (see Horgan 1994) point up the continuing relevance of behaviorism’s metaphysical and methodological challenges.

learning theory

 What is learning? Is it a change in behaviour or understanding? Is it a process? Here we survey some common models.

contents: introduction · learning as a product · task-conscious or acquisition learning, and learning-conscious or formalized learning ·learning as a process  · the behaviourist orientation to learning · the cognitive orientation to learning · the humanistic orientation to learning · the social/situational orientation to learning · further reading · how to cite this article

I want to talk about learning. But not the lifeless, sterile, futile, quickly forgotten stuff that is crammed in to the mind of the poor helpless individual tied into his seat by ironclad bonds  of conformity! I am talking about LEARNING - the insatiable curiosity that drives the adolescent boy to absorb everything he can see or hear or read about gasoline engines in order to improve the efficiency and speed of his 'cruiser'. I am talking about the student who says, "I am discovering, drawing in from the outside, and making that which is drawn in a real part of me." I am talking about any learning in which the experience of the learner progresses along this line: "No, no, that's not what I want"; "Wait! This is closer to what I am interested in, what I need"; "Ah, here it is! Now I'm grasping and comprehending what I need and what I want to know!" Carl Rogers 1983: 18-19
For all the talk of learning amongst educational policymakers and practitioners, there is a surprising lack of attention to what it entails. In Britain and Northern Ireland, for example, theories of learning do not figure strongly in professional education programmes for teachers and those within different arenas of informal education. It is almost as if it is something is unproblematic and that can be taken for granted. Get the instructional regime right, the message seems to be, and learning (as measured by tests and assessment regimes) will follow. This lack of attention to the nature of learning inevitably leads to an impoverishment of education. It isn't simply that the process is less effective as a result, but what passes for education can actually diminish well-being.
Here we begin by examining learning as a product and as a process. The latter takes us into the arena of competing learning theories - ideas about how learning may happen. We also look at Alan Roger's (2003) helpful discussion of task-conscious or acquisition learning, and learning-conscious or formalized learning.

Empowering youth in rural Indonesian villages

In a rural village in the Kulon Progo District of Yogyakarta, Indonesia, the foreign visitor′s arrival causes a stir among local children playing in a common space that is used to learn and practice typical dance and music. A bit shy at first, some of the children decide to smile and pose for a picture. The daring ones laugh out loud at the situation.

Hargotirto village is one of several places in Indonesia where focused educational activities take place, developed by a local network established under the Regional Centres of Expertise (RCE) initiative of the Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Programme at the United Nations University Institute of Advanced Studies (UNU-IAS).
Part of a global community of 89 RCEs worldwide, each RCE focuses on specific set of sustainability-related challenges, according to their realities and geographical location. Within their own spheres of activity, RCEs contribute to local sustainable development with educational projects to introduce, transform and incorporate sustainable practices into daily living.
In Indonesia, the challenges are diverse — ranging from environmental degradation and pollution to economic gaps and poverty, disaster risks and management, among others. To tackle some of these issues, RCE Yogyakarta is concentrating its activities on community service and empowerment, carrying out several projects within the Student Community Service-Community Empowerment Learning (SCS-CEL) Programme through its main stakeholder, Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM).
As part of the programme, university students are required to reside for two months in local communities. With supervision by lecturers, they must develop a series of activities that empower local people in terms of improving and sustaining what is already in place, by improving agricultural practices or cattle care. Alternatively, they can create ways to implement and adapt scientific findings according to local challenges and needs by, for example, providing knowledge on pumping water and building reservoirs for clean water distribution.
The programme is a requirement for graduation. However, despite its compulsory nature, students demonstrate that other factors motivate them to engage and develop specific projects. Some of them come from small villages and, therefore, say they deeply empathize with local problems — like Riani Anggun Mumpuni, enrolled in the September–November 2011 class in Hargotirto village. Her colleague, I Gede Arya Pardita, voiced recognition of the social and economic gaps between urban and rural communities and cites this as motiviation for dedicating effort to improving educational levels, which ultimately contributes to increasing income and promoting welfare and well-being.

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: BREAKING DAWN - PART 2 - Teaser Trailer