Behaviorist and cognitive learning

The big difference between behaviorist and cognitive learning perspectives is that behaviorism is more about explaining things through ones outward behavior or something that can be observed. Cognitivism is more based around cognitive processes like decision making and memory. These two perspectives are important when a teacher is deciding the methods of teaching styles are working or not. The students will have different learning behaviors between students and grades, so it is important as an educator to use these methods to best fit your class. It is important to apply these perspectives of learning to instruction when we mentioned in class about Albert Bandura’s theory that environmental, personal, and behavior factors all flow together from one to the other. Whats good about this theory is that it really defines what kind of behavior will be seen in the classroom. A reason why one student may act very good compared to really bad is that their parents may be more nurturing rather than neglecting. What’s important about this is that just because the good student is grown up to be a good person, it would be good to understand why the misbehaving kid is bad. My dad is a teacher, and he has told me a number of times of when kids that are less fortunate at home acted out. Then he has realized that a lot of the kids didn’t have a father figure, so he became a positive role model and made a connection, and believe it or not, he has turned a lot of kids around in a positive direction.

In the classroom, the role of the teacher is to understand how well your students progress and what makes learning easy to them. One teaching method year after year will not be good enough, different students learn in different ways each years and it is the teachers job to figure that out. The views that reside within my own beliefs in regards to the role of teacher, peers, and students is social cognitive. I really like the idea of students learning after each other and communicating. Sometimes a student may not understand a correct way of doing an assignment or activity, so working together may help improve their study habits and communication. What is important to me though is that since I personally like that method the best for me, other students may not like that idea. So when I personally teach, I plan on trying different methods and theories to figure out which environment the students like the best.

Chew, S. (2011, August 16). How to Get the Most Out of Studying: Part 3 of 5, “Cognitive Principles for Optimizing Learning”. Retrieved March 14, 2017

Woolfolk, A. (2014). Educational Psychology: Active Learning Edition. Pearson.

Dewer, G., Dr. (2013, March). The authoritative parenting style: Warmth, rationality, and high standards.