The Learning Process

For as long as I can remember I have been fascinated with the way people think and the decisions that they make as a result of their thought process.  As a high school student, I wanted to pursue a degree in Psychology in order to continue my pondering and to help others, but that did not happen. My oldest daughter, however, obtained her Bachelor's of Psychology just over a year ago, so I guess she pursued my dream for me! 

As I am pursuing my Master's in Instructional Design, I find it ironic that I am learning something similar and I am loving it!  To this day I am still fascinated with the things that people do, the ways they react, and why they make the decisions that they make.  With this course I am currently taking, I may not find the answers to these questions; however, I will hopefully be able to figure out how and why they learn the way that they do!

I am also learning a lot about the way that I learn and/or process information, as well as retain it.  What I am finding the most is that I am not encoding information in my brain so that I can pull it back out later as needed, as described at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_processing_theory.  I do a good job of thinking and analyzing information to the extreme, but I do not do a good job of storing this information in my long-term memory.  Most of the reason, I believe, is because I do not participate in proper methods to help myself retain this information, such as writing it down to help it soak in.  My life has become so busy that I do as little as possible to retain the information in my short-term memory then merely forget about it or do not take the necessary steps to retain it long-term.

As a firm believer in wikipedia and the information they provide, I am also relying on information from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_(learning_theory) to assist in the learning process.  I am a firm believer that childhood activities can and will shape a person’s entire life and this belief has been proven time and time again, especially by children who have had traumatic experiences.  This may not be exactly what constructivism is or what it pertains to, but events from childhood, whether they be playing or traumatic, can be critical to how someone learns throughout their lifetime.