Happy Learning

After six weeks of delving into the world of learning theories, learning styles, and all things brain, I have discovered a few things about how I learn, how I enjoy learning, and what style of learning I use the most.

Being the offspring of two teachers, I’ve always loved learning and exploring. Although I’m technically a digital native, I relate to the world of the digital immigrant more (Sullivan, 2011). I still buy real physical books and I look forward to “unplugging” everyday. This makes how I learn eclectic in that I enjoy and even crave traditional face-to face cognitive style learning but I also thrive in both social learning and Connectivism.

I prefer Social Learning Theory style best because it allows me to collaborate with others while still being able to observe the behaviors or ideas of other learners and professionals. By far I employ the Connectivism Theory for my learning the most. I have created numerous networks for work, school, and my personal life. Information is so readily available and technology is changing so fast that these networks help me stay connected and current on the topics I need in order to be successful. Most of my learning in Connectivism comes from “non-human appliances” (Davis, Edmunds, Kelly-Bateman, 2008). Because this is the mode I do most of my learning in I seek out good old fashion lectures for things I consider fun learning like art history. But even for a good portion of my “fun” learning I have to implore the help of technology like Khan Academy instead of going to a brick and mortar institution.

Technology has made learning and education widely accessible. Because of the pace of my days, I use technology in a variety of ways to learn. I used an just this morning to help me identify a bird at the feeder instead of using my bird book because the app is exponentially faster. In college I worked at a retirement home for nuns and someone had locked their padlock onto my locker so I watched a YouTube video on how to open a padlock by just using a part of a pop can. When I’m looking for some design inspiration for logos, flyers, or brochures I Google “best posters of 2014.” At work I use technology to stay connected to the networks I’ve created to better support me in my instructional design work. I use blogs, forums, user groups, Lynda.com, and videos to help me create our company’s eLearning lessons.

The real question is: how do I learn best? Ertmer and Newby (1993) said it best when they said “is there a single ‘best’ approach and is one approach more efficient that the others? Given that learning is a complex, drawn-out process that seems to be strongly influenced by one’s prior knowledge, perhaps the best answer to these questions is it depends.”

-Happy Learning.

Reference List

Davis, C.,Edmunds, E., &Kelly-Bateman, V. (2008). Connectivism. In M. Orey (Ed.), Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved from http://epltt.coe.uga.edu/index.php?title=Main_Page

Ertmer, P. A., & Newby, T. J. (1993). Behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism: Comparing critical features from an instructional design perspective. Performance Improvement Quarterly, 6(4),50-71.

Sullivan, B. (2011, August 12). Are you A Digital Native or a Digital Immigrant. BigDesign. Retrieved from http://bigdesignevents.com/2011/08/are-you-a-digital-native-or-a-digital-immigrant/