Reflection

     What I found surprising as I furthered my knowledge about how people learn is all the information and the depth of each, level and sublevels providing an insight that learning and humans are complex and depending on the number of different learning/environmental scenario a triggering factor of (X) amount of learning combinations (learning theories, learning styles, educational technology, and motivations) can be used to design curriculum to satisfied an individual’s ability to maximizes their comprehension of the learning event.  The most important thing I learned is that you will not be able to factor each student’s learning method a 100% but by understanding the basic foundation of all the learning theories and how the other elements work together you will be able to define common learning patterns that best suited for the content and the majority of your target learning population (i.e. age, knowledge level, experience, ect).

     How has this course deepened my understanding of my personal learning process?  Before this course I thought I knew how I was able to learn new information but after these pasted eight weeks, I now realize that I only had a limit amount of knowledge about how I learned.  I have discovered that I use a combination of all the theories depending on the content or learning environment but I favor the learning styles of auditory and Tactile/Kinesthetic.  Explaining why I have a hard time staying focused and sitting still during long lectures and why I recall information if I hear it virus reading it first.  Never realized why I can recall some learned information and can’t remember; other information as if it was on the tip of my tongue.  I learn best when I can relate the information to past experiences, the foundation of the Constructivist Theory and Cognitive Theory.  I also found that I could learn faster if information is expressed in a group setting, sharing each other’s in trepidation utilizing the Social Learning Theory.  I learned that at different times my motivation it triggered by the “need for approval” to gain of acceptance and respect of my knowledge from my peers as well search for knowledge just to know, the “need for achievement” motivation.

     What I have learned these eight weeks regarding the connection between learning theories, learning styles, educational technology, and motivation; is two things first, in the beginning each theory was thought to be a new discovery, independent of each other.  Second they are in my opinion all parts and pieces of a whole in terms of how the brain intrepid, implies and stores information allowing a human to learn and function as they grow (e.g. steps of learning, the higher the step the deeper the learning).  They seem to me to act together as a learning evaluation; each piece addressing required action supported by a specific and/or combination of a mean (s), reinforced by a form of motivation, each when used properly increases the likely hood of recall.

     How will my learning in this course help me as I further my career in the field of instructional design?  This course will help me tremendously because with this new knowledge and skill that I have learned from this course about the different foundation of learning theories and how the other elements work in support of maximizing the learning effects for the student.  I now have as they say a deeper understanding of how to use “my tool in my toolbox” as well as a conformation that what I suspected about how human’s is true; inspiring me to feel confident to be more creative in my development of my future designed curriculum and to be open to the possibility that a learning solution might be just right outside the box of traditional instructional design.  I will end this with some inspirational quotes that I thought summed up my thoughts about what I have learned from this course:

If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail by Abraham Maslow

You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives by 
Clay P. Bedford

Aim for success, not perfection.  Never give up your right to be wrong, because then you will lose the ability to learn new things and move forward with your life.  Remember that fear always lurks behind perfectionism by David M. Burns

Do not train children to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each by Plato 

21 Inspirational Quotes on Education by Henrik Edberg:  http://www.positivityblog.com/index.php/2007/04/20/21-inspirational-quotes-on-education/