While the tenor of humanistic theory is generally wishy-washy liberal, its approach also underlies the more committed stance of (Mezirow) and (Freire). “” “conscientization” Its most fertile ground is with intrinsically motivated learners. It is not as potent now as it was in the '70s, when it often seemed to be used as an excuse for the abrogation of the realistic authority of the teacher—or perhaps we have just become more mature in our use of it. As the politicised variants show, it poses considerable challenges not only to approaches to teaching, but also to the construction of the curriculum as a whole. As society has become more fragmented and "post-modern", these challenges have become even more problematic. Figures in Humanistic models of Learning Carl Rogers (1902-1987) Principally known as the founder of person-centred psychotherapy and almost the inventor of counselling, also a leading figure in the development of humanistic approaches to education. Maslow Abraham Maslow wanted to understand what motivates people. He believed that people possess a set of motivation systems unrelated to rewards or unconscious desires. Maslow (1943) stated that people are motivated to achieve certain needs. When one need is fulfilled a person seeks to fullfil the next one, and so on. Constructivism Jerome Bruner A major theme in the theoretical framework of Bruner is that learning is an active process in which learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge. The learner selects and transforms information, constructs hypotheses, and makes decisions, relying on a cognitive structure to do so. Cognitive structure (i.e., schema, mental models) provides meaning and organization to experiences and allows the individual to "go beyond the information given". As far as instruction is concerned, the instructor should try and encourage students to discover principles by themselves. The instructor and student should engage in an active dialog (i.e., socratic learning). The task of the instructor is to translate information to be learned into a format appropriate to the learner's current state of understanding. Curriculum should be organized in a spiral manner so that the student continually builds upon what they have already learned. Constructivism is the label given to a set of theories about learning which fall somewhere between cognitive and humanistic views. If behaviourism treats the organism as a black box,
While the tenor of humanistic theory is generally wishy-washy liberal, its approach also underlies the more committed stance of “” (Mezirow) and “conscientization” (Freire). Its most fertile ground is with intrinsically motivated learners. It is not as potent now as it was in the '70s, when it often seemed to be used as an excuse for the abrogation of the realistic authority of the teacher—or perhaps we have just become more mature in our use of it. As the politicised variants show, it poses considerable challenges not only to approaches to teaching, but also to the construction of the curriculum as a whole. As society has become more fragmented and "post-modern", these challenges have become even more problematic. Figures in Humanistic models of Learning Carl Rogers (1902-1987) Principally known as the founder of person-centred psychotherapy and almost the inventor of counselling, also a leading figure in the development of humanistic approaches to education. Maslow Abraham Maslow wanted to understand what motivates people. He believed that people possess a set of motivation systems unrelated to rewards or unconscious desires. Maslow (1943) stated that people are motivated to achieve certain needs. When one need is fulfilled a person seeks to fullfil the next one, and so on. Constructivism Jerome Bruner A major theme in the theoretical framework of Bruner is that learning is an active process in which learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge. The learner selects and transforms information, constructs hypotheses, and makes decisions, relying on a cognitive structure to do so. Cognitive structure (i.e., schema, mental models) provides meaning and organization to experiences and allows the individual to "go beyond the information given". As far as instruction is concerned, the instructor should try and encourage students to discover principles by themselves. The instructor and student should engage in an active dialog (i.e., socratic learning). The task of the instructor is to translate information to be learned into a format appropriate to the learner's current state of understanding. Curriculum should be organized in a spiral manner so that the student continually builds upon what they have already learned. Constructivism is the label given to a set of theories about learning which fall somewhere between cognitive and humanistic views. If behaviourism treats the organism as a black box,
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