Antony Kontellis UTS Blog

The Humanist approach developed from the Cognitive but focuses on experiential learning and the assumption that the individual is ever seeking greater personal adequacy, self-esteem and self-actualisation.
Humanists emphasise the individual’s innate need to achieve personal worth, dignity and creativity and believe a better society will evolve by nurturing these qualities.
Humanist teachers can create a positive [...]

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Cognitive psychologists emphasize the role of experience, the development of meaning, and the use of problem-solving and insight as the sources of learning.
The individual learner will perceives organised wholes – rather than disconnected pieces.
Each person will behave and learn in terms of what is real for them.
Learning is therefore based on the re-organisation of experiences [...]

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Behaviourists attempted to study behaviour and learning from a scientific approach – only observable and measurable behaviours are reliable. 
They explain human behaviour in terms of cause and effect – therefore learning is a modification of behaviour by application of stimuli, shaping of responses and the provision of reinforcement.
Learning is demonstrated in the response or behaviour [...]

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What is learning?
“The best definition is to conceive of learning as a relatively permanent change in behaviour with behaviour including both observable activity and internal processes such as thinking, attitudes and emotions.”
Burns, R. 1995, The Adult Learner at Work. 
 
What is your definition of learning? 
I would define learning as the process of being presented with and [...]

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