GAGNE :
Robert Mills Gagné was an American Educational Psychologost best known for his conditions of learning. Gagné's work is sometimes summarized as "the Gagné assumption".Gagné's theory stipulates that there are several types and levels of learning, and each of these types and levels requires instruction that is tailored to meet the needs of the pupil.
EIGHT LEVEL OF LEARNING :
He identified eight basic types, and arranged these in the hierarchy. According to Gagné, the higher orders of learning in this hierarchy build upon the lower levels, requiring progressively greater amounts of previous learning for their success. The lowest four orders tend to focus on the more behavioral aspects of learning, while the highest four focus on the more cognitive aspects.
HIERARCHY - a simple outlook
1. Signal learning
This is the simplest form of learning, and consists essentially of the classical conditioning first described by the behavioral psychologist Pavlov. In this type of learning the animal or individual acquires a conditioned response to a given signal.
Example : a. When there is a Red Signal in road, people stop their Vehicles.
b. When door bell rings, people suddenly rushes to door to open it.
Here,
The Signal is : Red Light and Ringing of Door Bell
Conditioned Response is : People Stop their Vehicles and People rush to open the Door
2. Stimulus-response learning
This is also known as operand conditioning, was originally developed by Skinner. Stimulus-response learning is all about getting a response to a Stimuli.
Example : a. When a Teacher instructs the Students to raise their hands, the Students immediately raise their hands
b. When we place a plant in dark room, it get destroyed and when it is placed in a sun shade it grows well
Here,
The Stimuli is: Teacher instructing the Students , Placing a plant in dark room
The Response is: Students raising their hands , Plant gets destroyed
3. Chaining
This type of learning is the ability to connect two or more previously-learned stimulus-response bonds into a linked sequence. It is the process whereby most complex psycho motor skills (eg riding a bicycle or playing the piano) are learned.In this type of learning the person links together previously learned Stimulus - Response
Example : a. When a Child saw a Doll, it first represent it as a Baby, it dresses up the Doll, do make up to the Doll, then Feeds the Doll
b. Selecting an appropriate key from the Bunch of Keys.
Here,
a. The Child connects the activities of Bathing, Feeding an taking care of the Doll that is being learned from the elders. It watches how elders take care of the babies and recreate it when it looks at the doll. It learns and connects the related stimulus and response.
4. Verbal association
This is a form of chaining in which the links between the items being connected are verbal in nature. Verbal association is one of the key processes in the development of language skills.This learning is a type of chaining, but the links are verbal units. The simplest verbal association is the activity of naming an object, which involves a chain of two links
Example : a. When a Child names an object "BALL " , it also says " ROUND BALL ", "BLACK and WHITE BALL"
Here,
The Child associates the word "BALL" with its "SHAPE", "COLOUR"
5. Discrimination learning
This involves developing the ability to make appropriate (different) responses to a series of similar stimuli that differ in a systematic way. This involves the development of the ability to differentiate an OBJECT , by its COLOUR, SHAPE etc..
Example : a. When a student develops the ability to differentiate and call each student by his/her correct name.
b. When seeing lots of cars in the road, differentiating the cars by its name
Here,
These are all Cars, the ability to differentiate them,is Discrimination learning
6. Concept learning
This involves developing the ability to make a consistent response to different stimuli that form a common class or category of some sort. It forms the basis of the ability to generalize, classify etc.In learning a concept we respond to stimuli in terms of abstract characteristics like color, shape, position and number as opposed to concrete physical properties like specific wavelengths or particular intensities.
Example : Observing the Common Concept in the objects.
a. While Driving a bike, one must Start with Clutch, gear and then slowly release the clutch and raise the Accelerator
b. While Driving a Car, one must Start with Clutch, gear and then slowly release the clutch and raise the Accelerator
Here,
The Common Concept is "Start with Clutch, gear and then slowly release the clutch and raise the Accelerator" is being learned.
7. Rule learning
This is a very-high-level cognitive process that involves being able to learn relationships between concepts and apply these relationships in different situations, including situations not previously encountered. In learning a rule we relate two or more concepts. Rules are, in effect, chains of concepts. We may represent knowledge as a hierarchy of rules, in which we must learn two or more rules before learning a higher order rule which embraces them.
Example : When an air filled Ball is kicked, it flies, rolls and revolves, it is a common rule. In this rule concepts such as flying, rolling, revolving etc are learned. It represents the chaining of more than one concept in a rule.
Here,
The concepts such as flying, rolling, revolving are chained together
8. Problem solving
This is the highest level of cognitive process according to Gagne. It involves developing the ability to invent a complex rule, algorithm or procedure for the purpose of solving one particular problem, and then using the method to solve other problems of a similar nature.
- In the set of events called problem solving, individuals use rule to achieve some goal. When the goal is reached, however the student has learned something more and is then capable of new performances using his new knowledge.
- hat is learned, is a higher order rule, the combined product of two or more lower order rules. Thus the problem solving requires those internal events usually called thinking..
- Without knowledge of the prerequisite rules, the problem can not be solved.
Educational Implications:
1. Gain Attention: The first event or step of instruction is to gain attention to get the reception of stimuli.
2 Informing the learners the objective: it is important to inform the learner of the purpose and expected outcome of the learning to provide the motivation to learners.
3. Stimulating recall of prior learning: the learners are asked to recall the existing relevant knowledge.
4. Presenting the stimulus: relevant stimulus to the subject matter should be presented.
5. Providing learning guidance: it request instructor to make the stimulus as meaningful as possible.
6. Eliciting performance: the learners are asked to demonstrate the newly learnt behaviour.
7. Providing feedback: giving informative feedback to learners performance is important.
8. Assessing performance: it consists of assessments to verify the learning has occurred.
9. Enhancing retention and transfer: it refers to retaining the land capability over a long period of time and transferring it to new situations outside the learning environment.
