Y165_3

Learning to learn: Exploring learning

About this free course

This free course provides a sample of level 1 study in Education, Childhood & Youth http://www.open.ac.uk/courses/find/education-childhood-and-youth

This version of the content may include video, images and interactive content that may not be optimised for your device.

You can experience this free course as it was originally designed on OpenLearn, the home of free learning from The Open University:
http://www.open.edu/openlearn/education/learning-learn-exploring-learning/content-section-0.

There you’ll also be able to track your progress via your activity record, which you can use to demonstrate your learning.

The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA

Copyright © 2016 The Open University

Intellectual property

Unless otherwise stated, this resource is released under the terms of the Creative Commons Licence v4.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/deed.en_GB. Within that The Open University interprets this licence in the following way: www.open.edu/openlearn/about-openlearn/frequently-asked-questions-on-openlearn. Copyright and rights falling outside the terms of the Creative Commons Licence are retained or controlled by The Open University.
Please read the full text before using any of the content.

We believe the primary barrier to accessing high-quality educational experiences is cost, which is why we aim to publish as
much free content as possible under an open licence. If it proves difficult to release content under our preferred Creative
Commons licence (e.g. because we can’t afford or gain the clearances or find suitable alternatives), we will still release
the materials for free under a personal end-user licence.

This is because the learning experience will always be the same high quality offering and that should always be seen as positive
– even if at times the licensing is different to Creative Commons.

When using the content you must attribute us (The Open University) (the OU) and any identified author in accordance with the
terms of the Creative Commons Licence.

The Acknowledgements section is used to list, amongst other things, third party (Proprietary), licensed content which is not
subject to Creative Commons licensing. Proprietary content must be used (retained) intact and in context to the content at
all times.

The Acknowledgements section is also used to bring to your attention any other Special Restrictions which may apply to the
content. For example there may be times when the Creative Commons Non-Commercial Sharealike licence does not apply to any
of the content even if owned by us (The Open University). In these instances, unless stated otherwise, the content may be
used for personal and non-commercial use.

We have also identified as Proprietary other material included in the content which is not subject to Creative Commons Licence. These
are OU logos, trading names and may extend to certain photographic and video images and sound recordings and any other material
as may be brought to your attention.

Unauthorised use of any of the content may constitute a breach of the terms and conditions and/or intellectual property laws.

We reserve the right to alter, amend or bring to an end any terms and conditions provided here without notice.

All rights falling outside the terms of the Creative Commons licence are retained or controlled by The Open University.

Head of Intellectual Property, The Open University

Edited and designed by The Open University.

Printed and bound in the United Kingdom by Scot Print Ltd.

978-1-4730-1901-0 (.kdl)
978-1-4730-1133-5 (.epub)

Contents

- Introduction

- Learning outcomes

- How to study this course

- Enrolling onto this course

- How to complete the quizzes

- course forum and Facebook group

- 1 Getting feedback from other people

- 1.1 Why can feedback be useful?

- 1.2 What problems might you have with getting feedback?

- 1.3 How it might be possible to get another perspective?

- 1.4 The Johari Window

- 1.5 Responding to feedback

- 1.6 Developing your own Johari Window

- 1.7 Changing your Johari Window by getting feedback

- 2 Your learning – What does ‘theory’ offer?

- 2.1 Why theory might be useful

- 2.2 An overview of learning theories

- 2.3 Bringing together theory and personal understanding: The difference between academic writing and reflective writing

- 2.4 Evaluating learning theories

- 2.5 An alternative perspective: The importance of other people in our immediate social and learning environments

- 2.6 Theories of informal learning

- 2.7 Communities of practice

- 2.8 Entwistle’s theory of student approaches to learning

- 2.9 Further reflection on the usefulness of learning theories

- 3 Preparing to move on – Connecting theory with skills

- 3.1 Academic skills

- 3.2 ‘Real-world’ skills

- 4 Conclusion

- Keep on learning

- References

- Acknowledgements

Introduction

In Exploring learning we want you to consider how other people can help you change. If you are studying this course as part of the Learning to learn course, you'll find that it builds on the evidence you gathered about yourself in You and your learning. The Learning to learn course sets out different ways of using learning to help you achieve your goals for change and development.

There are two main aspects to this:

1. Involving other people so that you can get feedback, and increase the depth of your self-understanding

2. The second aspect involves people who have written about learning in ways that we think you will find useful when thinking
about your own skills and personal development.

This OpenLearn course provides a sample of level 1 study in Education, Childhood & Youth

Learning outcomes

After studying this course, you should be able to:

- use feedback from others to explore qualities, knowledge and skills

- use academic theory to increase an understanding of learning experiences and personal development

- reflect on the academic skills used and the knowledge gained.

How to study this course

This course is slightly different to other OpenLearn Study Units. Although you could study this course on its own, it is also
the third course of the free Learning to learn course. This course pilots an exciting new approach that aims to give you more flexibility and a pathway to expand your learning,
so please bear with us if things are not quite right.

Learning to learn is for people who are thinking about making changes in their lives, such as returning to study or taking a different direction
at work. It will help you to build on what you already know; to consider the choices open to you; to use your skills and qualities
to achieve change; and to make plans for the future. To find out more go to the Learning to learn course page.

The course is designed to be studied in one week, although you can take as long as you like. If you are studying the course
as part of the Learning to learn course you may like to aim to complete each course in a week.

Working through this course

As you work through the course, breaks will be important. You will have to determine how long you can study this material
before you need to stop and relax. Be sure to take advantage of all of your resources – friends, family, the internet.

Learning Journals

As you work through the course it is a good idea to keep a Learning Journal, where you can make notes on activities, key
words and concepts or elements that are particularly relevant for you. Your Learning Journal can either be a notebook or you
may wish to create an electronic journal either by creating a document on your computer or mobile device, or create a personal
blog.

Thinking about how you are getting on with your learning is also very helpful when it comes to improving how you are learning
or simply looking back on your progress so far. You can use your Learning Journal to do this. Think about whether you have
found the best time to study, whether you are taking enough or too many notes, and whether you have understood all the concepts
covered in a course.

How you use your Learning Journal is personal to you. Writing things down in your own words will help your understanding.
It will give you a handy review of the main ideas that you can refer to later. People learn in different ways, and it is important
for you to experiment to find out which methods work best for you.

Support

While there is no officially support on this course, we hope that you, as a community of learners, will support each other
and share ideas. As this is the first time the course has been run, the OpenLearn team will be monitoring the comments and
forums to assist with common issues.

Pencasts

This course also features pencasts, which are animated PDF files with an audio commentary. In order to view these you will
need to have Adobe Reader X or higher with the volume on your computer/device turned up.

Comments, forums and Facebook group

You can share your ideas and ask questions via the comments function or in the course forum or on the Learning to learn Facebook group. You do not have to use any, or all, of these platforms to share your thoughts and meet other learners. Use the online environment
you feel most comfortable with.

Why do we provide a choice? Everyone has a preference for how they engage on online. Some will want to be actively involved
throughout the course whereas others may just dip in and out without participating. As this is a pilot, we are interested
in finding out if our learners would like the option of using social networking sites like Facebook as a community area.

If you have questions or suggestions on how we could improve the course or course please address them to the OpenLearn team
and post them in the forum discussion - Questions for OpenLearn.

Enrolment

This course is for people who are thinking about making changes in their lives, such as returning to study or taking a different
direction at work. It will help you build on what you already know; consider the choices open to you; use your skills and
qualities to achieve change; and make plans for the future. Although you can view this course without enrolling, in order
to participate in its activities and quizzes, you need to enrol.

Enrolling onto this course

If you already have an OpenLearn account, just sign in and click on the enrol button.

Figure 1 OpenLearn enrol button

If you are new to OpenLearn, you will need to register for a free Open University account. To do this, click on the sign in
button at the top of the screen, which will take you to The Open University sign-in page. Click on the ‘Create a free Open
University account here’ link and fill in the form that will appear. Then return to the OpenLearn website and sign in. The
enrol button will be visible for you to click on to register your interest in this course with us. If the enrol button does
not appear, try signing out and back in again – the button should then be visible.

If you are an existing OU student, you do not need to register with OpenLearn – you can sign in and enrol using your OU computer
user name. Unless you wish to use a separate account we would recommend using your OU student account. It is not necessary
to enrol to view the course materials, only if you wish to participate in the forums.

Once you are enrolled you unfortunately the system currently does not notify you or make it obvious you have successfully
enrolled, however the enrol button will change to ‘Unenrol’.

Figure 2 OpenLearn unenrol button

Please note

By enrolling on the Exploring learning course you are giving us permission to contact you by email with information about this course and the OpenLearn Learning to learn course for research purposes in relation to this course.

By registering with OpenLearn you are giving us permission to contact you for research purposes in relation to OpenLearn.
If you do not wish to receive emails in relation to this OpenLearn research, please go to your profile page, click on edit
and opt out.

What do you hope to get out of this course

How to complete the quizzes

Before starting the quiz we recommend you read the following hints and tips about how the quiz system works.

How to use the quiz system:

- Quiz questions are presented in sequence. It is possible to skip questions and come back to them later. To move to a different
question, click on the question number on the left-hand side of the screen.

- You are advised not to use the ‘Back’ function on your web browser.

- Quizzes have no time limit. You may take as long as you wish to answer each question.

- If you have problems viewing any part of a quiz, it is likely that an out-of-date web browser is the cause. Make sure that
you are using the most up-to-date version of your web browser when accessing quizzes.

While working through the questions, you will need to do the following:

- The Check button must be pressed after entering or selecting your answer – otherwise your answer is not registered by the system.

- The Try Again button will appear if your answer is partially correct or incorrect. You may press this button to reattempt answering the
question. In most activities you are permitted two attempts per question.

- Once you have finished working on each question, click the Next button, which displays below the feedback to move on to the next question.

When you have completed the quiz, you will be shown a review of your answers. You may go back to any questions you have skipped
and reattempt them. Once you are satisfied with your answers, or once you run out of attempts, remember to return to the review
screen and press the ‘Submit all and finish’ button located at the bottom to register your answers.

If you have worked through the quiz in order, the summary screen will appear automatically upon completion. If you have answered
the questions out of order, you may access the summary screen at any time by selecting ‘End test...’ (on the left of the screen).

Do not get discouraged if your answers are not correct. You may reattempt all of the quizzes as many times as you wish. Take your time, read the questions and refer back to what you have studied if you are not sure.

course forum and Facebook group

Within this course you have the opportunity to contribute to and participate in the course forum and in the Learning to learn Facebook group which are entirely optional to engage with.

Within both you can share your ideas and thoughts about the course and potentially build a support network with other learners
who are studying at the same time as you. In addition, within the course some activities will ask you to post to the forum
and Facebook group.

course forum

Facebook group

Please note you will need a Facebook account to participate in the Facebook group.

Posting online guidance

In a forum there are a number of limitations that you do not always encounter when talking to someone face-to-face because
other people will not be able to see your facial expression or hear the tone of your voice, so what and how you write become
important. Some useful tips are:

- Keep to the subject, and pick the right discussion thread for your contribution.

- Before you write a message, take time to see what is being discussed and think about your reply.

- Try to keep messages short.

- Write a good subject line (title) for your message – people often haven’t time to read messages unless the subject line looks
relevant.

- Keep to one subject (one topic of discussion) per message.

- When replying to a message, only quote part of the earlier message if you need to. Don’t include everything, or messages get
longer and longer.

- Don’t be discourage if you receive no acknowledgement of your message. We would encourage you to thank and acknowledge those
who have commented, in order to encourage them and other to participate.

- If you disagree with a point that has been made, acknowledge the point before stating why you disagree.

- Make your perspective clear, but try to avoid speaking impersonally, to encourage debate.

- Clearly show your emotions, people can’t see faces and body language, so the use of smileys or emoticons such as :- ) or :-
( can be a useful way to get your emotion across.

- If you read something that offends or upsets you, while it might be tempting to fire back a hurried response, don’t, take
time to think about your response before replying, or if you feel it is appropriate report the comment to the OpenLearn team.

- AND FINALLY, DON’T WRITE IN CAPITAL LETTERS – IT WILL LOOK LIKE YOU’RE SHOUTING!

1 Getting feedback from other people

Have you ever been told something about yourself that you didn’t know, resulting in your gaining confidence in your abilities?
The chances are that the answer is yes.

Getting feedback from another person can be incredibly useful in confidence building and in highlighting areas for personal
development. However, it can also be difficult and even stressful.

This section of Exploring learning explores how feedback can be useful, as well as looking at possible difficulties and ways of dealing with these. Later in
this course, we will look at how other people may be involved in helping you achieve personal change.

First, though, we’ll explore how other people can help you to gather information about your current qualities, knowledge and
skills.

1.1 Why can feedback be useful?

The advantage of gathering evidence from other people is that they will have a different view of you from the one you have
of yourself. Drawing on this perspective can help enrich how you think about yourself.

We recognise that you may be working on this course by yourself and that it might be difficult to get feedback. If this applies
to you, we recommend that you try and identify someone who might be prepared to provide you with feedback. This might be someone
at work or a close friend.

If this is difficult, you might want to try some of the alternatives that are suggested by the different activities in order
to get a different perspective on your qualities, knowledge and skills.

The course You and your learning focuses on gathering evidence about your qualities, knowledge and skills. If you have completed You and your learning you should have a clearer idea about these. If you have not done You and your learning, we would recommend that you do that course first as this course builds on your reflections about yourself by gaining information
from other people.

Figure 3 Freud’s theory represented as an iceberg

Some theories, like Sigmund Freud’s (shown in Figure 3) suggest there are aspects of ourselves that we are only slightly,
or not at all, aware of. Freud argued that the working of the unconscious part of the mind, those parts under the waterline
in the picture of the iceberg, is almost impossible to access. These hidden aspects could contain information that might be
useful for personal development.

The idea of using feedback builds on the idea that other people, because they have a different perspective, can help us to
gather information that would be difficult to gather if we worked alone.

Figure 4 360 degree feedback

This idea has been extended and is the basis of what is called 360-degree feedback. This can be used at work to give someone
as wide a picture as possible about how well he or she is doing. It involves having feedback from everyone whose views are
seen as helpful and relevant.

Activity 1: Identifying feedback

Allow about 10 minutes for this activity.

Watch the animated film below. It features two characters who will appear at various points in this course – Tina and Sophie.
As you watch the film, think about:

- What feedback Tina has received, and from whom?

- What feedback you might give Tina to help her in her job hunting?

Video content is not available in this format.

Video 1

View transcript - Video 1

View comment - Activity 1: Identifying feedback

1.2 What problems might you have with getting feedback?

Tina is very lucky to have two sources of feedback – her friend Sophie and the interview panel.

However, getting feedback is not always easy and only you know what problems you might have with finding someone to be a mentor
and give you feedback about your own qualities, knowledge and skills.

There may be all kinds of reason for this:

- you might not feel that you know anyone whom you would trust to give you feedback in a way in which you would find helpful

- acting as a feedback giver can put someone in such a powerful position that you might feel uncomfortable

- you might feel that you do not know anyone who has the right qualities and skills to help you

- other people’s opinions can make you feel less confident about yourself and may get in the way of creating a clear picture
of your strengths.

For these reasons, it is important to choose someone whom you trust to have your best interests at heart.

Activity 2: Problems with getting feedback

Allow about 10 minutes for this activity

This means you have a choice.

Take a few minutes to think about whom you could ask for feedback on the three main skills areas that are the focus of this
course: communication skills, problem solving skills and organisational skills. Then, make an entry in your Learning Journal
with the title ‘Activity 2: Who could I ask for feedback?’ and note your thoughts about which people you might ask for feedback.
If you can’t think of anyone to ask, then make a note of this instead.

View comment - Activity 2: Problems with getting feedback

1.3 How it might be possible to get another perspective?

The idea of starting on a process of personal change is that it will enhance your life – it will make your life better. So
it is important that you take good care of yourself. Part of doing this is to be careful about your decisions on who will
give you helpful and supportive feedback. If you decide that you do not know anyone who could provide you with this sort of
feedback, then you will be happy to know that this course suggests alternative ways to learn from the perspectives of other
people.

There are some well-established approaches that do not need someone else to be present and which are intended to help us think
about what other people might have to say about us.

Figure 5 Using the empty chair to gain another perspective

Perhaps the best known is the ‘empty-chair’ technique. This involves imagining that someone is sitting in the ‘empty chair’
and then imagining what they would have to say to us if they were actually present. In therapy, this is intended to make up
for things that were not discussed in the past, but which should have been.

In the context of Learning to learn, you could adapt the empty-chair technique to imagine what feedback on your skills and qualities someone you trust would
give you. As you are imagining what someone might say, you have unlimited scope to decide whom your mentor might be. You could,
for example, take one of the case-study subjects, or one of the animation characters, and imagine that they are giving you
feedback. Alternatively, you could choose someone for whom you have great respect or affection – even if you do not know them.

Of course, this ‘imagined’ feedback may be very different from what Shehnaz, or even someone like Nelson Mandela, might actually
say to you. The point is that the empty-chair technique can help you explore ideas from a perspective that will be different
from perspectives you may usually use. If the idea of imagining what people would say to you sounds second best to actually
getting feedback from someone, remember that students who do get this type of feedback still have to decide how to interpret
and make sense of it.

1.4 The Johari Window

In this section you will be introduced to a tool for thinking about the impact of feedback – namely, the ‘Johari Window’.

The Johari window is named after its originators, Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingram (for some reason there is only ever one
‘r’ in ‘Johari’). It consists of four areas, shown in Figure 6, and looks like the separate panes of a window.

Figure 6 Basic four-pane Johari Window

The open area covers what you know about yourself. You know about this aspect and are happy to share it with others. An example might
be if you are happy to tell someone about the strengths that you bring to your job.

The blind area covers what other people know about you, but of which you are not aware. You might, for instance, be unaware of always
using a particular phrase that irritates everyone with whom you come into contact.

The hidden area is what you know about yourself, but would prefer other people not to know. For example, this could include opinions
that you do not want to share with others, as well as any weaknesses that you feel you have.

The final area is unknown both to you and to others. This might include hidden talents, unconscious feelings, or abilities and qualities that have
never been brought to the surface. In other words, it may represent resources that could help your learning. Getting involved
in new activities with new groups of people increases the chances of your finding out about these, as yet unknown, resources.

None of these areas is fixed. We can increase the size of the open area by asking other people to tell us what they know about
us – in other words, by asking them for feedback. We can also increase this area by revealing hidden aspects of ourselves
to other people. We can reduce the size of the unknown area by looking into ourselves (self-discovery) or by finding out about
ourselves with the help of others (shared discovery).

These possibilities for movement are explained in the short video below. You should watch this now.

Video content is not available in this format.

Johari Window

View transcript - Johari Window

Activity 3: The Johari Window

Allow about 15 minutes for this activity

The Johari Window activity should help you to assess your understanding of the differences between the four areas featured in the Johari Window. The
activity features Tina and Sophie, the characters you met earlier in this course, together with some of their friends.

View comment - Activity 3: The Johari Window

1.5 Responding to feedback

Earlier in the course you saw an animated film where Tina discussed her recent job interview with her friend Sophie. The next
activity requires you to watch a video showing a continuation of their conversation where Sophie gives Tina some more feedback.

Activity 4: Responding to feedback

Allow about 10 minutes for this activity.

Watch the video below in which Tina receives some more feedback from Sophie. While you watch, take some notes about the feedback
that Tina is getting from Sophie and about Tina’s response to that feedback.

Video content is not available in this format.

Tina receives some more feedback from Sophie

View transcript - Tina receives some more feedback from Sophie

View comment - Activity 4: Responding to feedback

In the next activity you will be asked to think about feedback you have received in the past, and the impact that it had on
you.

Activity 5: Feedback you have had

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity.

Think back and choose a time when you have received feedback that has had a marked and positive effect on your learning. For
example, you might have had a maths teacher who gave you confidence in your ability with numbers. As a result, you still enjoy
working with figures and use them in daily activities, such as planning your household budget.

Write down the main aspects of the feedback you received. Did this feedback increase what you knew about yourself?

View comment - Activity 5: Feedback you have had

1.6 Developing your own Johari Window

As you have seen already, your Johari Window areas are not fixed. Their contents change and the window areas change in size
as we learn new things about ourselves and when we get feedback from others. In the next section of Learning to learn you will draw your own Johari Window, based on your responses to the activities you have done earlier in the course.

Activity 6: Drawing your own Johari Window

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity.

Use a large sheet of paper to draw yourself a Johari Window diagram. It should look like Figure 7.

Enter your identified qualities, skills and knowledge into the open and hidden areas of your Johari Window diagram, as appropriate.
(Remember that the hidden area contains information that you are aware of, but which you keep from others; for example, a
lack of confidence in job interviews.)

If you studied You and your learning, take a look back over your responses to the activities in that course, where you identified your qualities, skills and knowledge.

Figure 7 Personal Johari Window

View comment - Activity 6: Drawing your own Johari Window

1.7 Changing your Johari Window by getting feedback

The Johari window is a good way to think about the role of other people and our relationships with them. The window shows
that other people are significant in two ways:

1. If we share aspects of ourselves that increase our open area, this will decrease the size of the area that is unknown to others.
Doing this enables other people to be in a better position to give us accurate (and more helpful) feedback. People do have
to know something about us to give us information we can use

2. We can learn from others in order to increase our open area and decrease our blind area.

There are many ways in which we can get feedback from others. Perhaps the most obvious is to get feedback in person, from
someone you trust. However, you’ve also learned that it is possible to get ‘imagined’ feedback via the ‘ empty-chair’ technique.
In the next activity you will try to expand the size of your Johari Window open area, and decrease the size of your blind
area, by getting feedback from someone else.

Activity 7: Getting feedback from someone and changing your Johari Window

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity

This activity has two options:

1. Option 1 involves getting feedback from someone you know

2. Option 2 involves getting some ‘imagined feedback’.

You should choose just one of these options:

- Option 1: Show the open area of your completed Johari Window to someone that you trust. Ask them whether they can add any
information about your qualities, skills and/or knowledge, or offer a new perspective on the information that you have provided.
Add any new information to your Johari Window diagram.

- Option 2: Choose an imagined feedback giver to sit in your ‘empty chair’. Think about what they might say in response to your
current Johari Window open area. Might they add any additional qualities, skills or knowledge, or offer a new perspective?
If so, add this additional information to your diagram.

View comment - Activity 7: Getting feedback from someone and changing your Johari Window

Whenever you get additional feedback while studying Learning to learn you should revisit your Johari Window diagram and change it so that it reflects the new information about your skills, qualities
and knowledge. Doing this will mean that by the end of the course you will have a valuable resource to use in your future
personal development.

2 Your learning – What does ‘theory’ offer?

Figure 8 Theory isn’t just found in books – it stems from real-life experiences

The previous section of this course focused on using feedback to enhance what you already know about your qualities, skills
and knowledge. This section explores how you might draw on theory in the same way.

So, what do we mean by the term ‘theory’? A dictionary definition of theory is: ‘a supposition or system of ideas intended to explain something … a set of principles on which the practice of an activity
is based’ (New Oxford Dictionary, 1998, p. 1922). Using a general dictionary can be useful for clarifying the meaning of words used in academic work, but
it can also have its drawbacks, especially if the key word is being used in a specialised way. However, in this case, the
definition ties in well with what we hope you will do with theory. We hope that you will use theory to guide what you do (your
practice). In this course, the practice that we focus on is your learning.

2.1 Why theory might be useful

The main similarity between using academic theory and getting feedback is that both offer a perspective that may be different
from your own. We have already seen how additional perspectives can be valuable in rounding out the understanding you have
about yourself. One possible big advantage with academic theory is that this additional perspective can come from someone
who is recognised as an expert or authority.

Drawing on theory opens the possibility of building on ideas that have been developed over many years. The work of Peter Jarvis
(see Learning to learn, You and your learning) is an example of this. Often, academic writers like Jarvis try to develop frameworks. These frameworks can sometimes help
us to organise or structure information and ideas so that we are able to make more sense of them.

As you might guess, there are many, many theories in existence. You might have heard, for example, of Darwin’s theory of evolution
or Einstein’s theory of relativity. In Learning to learn, we are focusing on theories about learning. There are many of these, too. We do not have the time to go into all of them.
In any case, the purpose of introducing theory into the course is to give you the opportunity to use it to help you better
understand your learning and to put you in a stronger position to make decisions related to your personal development.

We have selected just four sets of theories that we feel will be particularly useful for students of Learning to learn:

- learning theories developed by psychology

- theories of formal and informal learning

- ‘Communities of practice’ theory, which focuses on the social aspects of learning

- theories focusing on student approaches and strategies, exploring how individual students approach learning.

As you work through the course you may feel that some of the theories you encounter are not relevant to you. Academic theory
about learning is unlikely to have considered your own experiences or the story of your life. This may mean that some parts
of a theory may not seem to apply to you. However, it is important to keep an open mind as you study these theories because
connections with your own learning experiences may not immediately be obvious, but instead may emerge over time.

You might also feel that you get along in life perfectly well without having to think about theory. You might even think that
having to do this might get in the way of living your life. If this is true for you, then we are going to have to convince
you that theory can have practical and even personal uses.

We’ll make a start now!

2.2 An overview of learning theories

It can be difficult to understand bits of theory without having an idea of the context that these theories come from. The
next activity asks you to read and take notes on a brief overview of some of the main strands of learning theories. The overview
is intended to make it easier to understand the important aspects of two particular theories that are discussed later in more
detail.

Study tip: Note taking

Note taking is an important aspect of study in general, and writing things down in note form is an important way of gathering
evidence.

In this course you have already used a variety of note-taking approaches to gather evidence about your own learning. You
might even have used mind mapping.

There are two important aspects about notes:

1. They need to be concise. There is no point just copying most of the material you are reading

2. They have to be useful and do what you want them to do.

For the next activity, your notes are the basis for your reflection on the possible usefulness of the theories.

Before doing the activity you should watch Using a table to take notes pencast, which introduces a method of note taking that you might like to try.

Activity 8: Exploring learning theories

Allow about 30 minutes for this activity.

This activity:

- provides an overview of some of the main strands of learning theories

- prompts you to consider how these theories may help you to understand your own learning.

Read the overview of learning theories that follows. Then read it again.

On the first read through, take notes on what you see as the main points. When you read the overview again, consider and take
notes about whether it helps you to understand your own learning in any way. You may find it useful to use a table for your
notes, formatted as shown in the pencast you have just watched.

An overview of learning theories

Many theories see learning as what happens when an individual animal or human being responds to something that happens. This
has been described as the way that a biological organism responds to its environment.

Figure 9 Pavlov’s dogs

Some theories see these responses as being outside our control; as being automatic. A good example of this is Ivan Pavlov’s
theory of classical conditioning. This theory argues that all animals (including humans) have little or no control about what
they learn in response to what happens to them. Pavlov tried to show this in famous experiments that caused dogs to learn
to salivate when a bell was rung, not just when they were given food. This is known as classical conditioning.

Later theorists such as B.F. Skinner argued that individual human beings, and other animals, played an important part. Different
reactions meant that different learning might take place in response to external events that appear to be similar. It is worth
noting that both Pavlov and Skinner saw learning simply as the result of responses to events in the environment. There was,
according to them, no need to think about the events.

This was challenged by theorists, including Albert Bandura. He argued that learning occurs as a result of people (or animals)
thinking about events and attempting to make sense of them. There is an emphasis in Bandura’s learning theory on the importance
of observational learning. As its name suggests, observational learning is ‘learning through watching the [behaviour] of another
person’ (Gross, 1996, p. 173). This is sometimes referred to as ‘modelling’. In this form of learning, the observed model
is the key aspect of the environment that is required for learning to take place.

The focus is still on how an individual learns, but the inclusion of another person in the picture means that learning is
no longer seen as a straightforward response by the learner to the environment.

Figure 10 Chimps using sticks

The next type of learning theory is called insight learning. This is associated with Wolfgang Köhler, who argued that the
chimpanzees he studied could change how they saw a problem when they were supplied with a previously missing ingredient, such
as a stick to reach an object or food (Gross, 1996, p. 174).

These theories are seen as the basis of learning theories in psychology. Despite their different stances, they all tend to
see learning as something that is concerned mainly with what goes on within an individual.

With the possible exception of Bandura’s learning theory, they pay little attention to the way that the learning occurs as
the result of interaction between people.

View comment - Activity 8: Exploring learning theories

Activity 9: Reflecting on the learning theories

Allow about 15 minutes for this activity.

Having just read about some of the learning theories that have been developed within psychology, now seems like a good time
to reflect on what you felt about Activity 8 and how you approached the task. Make a new entry in your Learning Journal. A
Learning Journal is a space where you can record your thoughts about studying and save useful notes and hints about your learning.
You can do this electronically on a blog or on paper. Make an entry with the title ‘Activity 9’. Add the subheading ‘Feelings’
and enter some notes about what you felt and thought about being asked to read ‘An overview of learning theories’. For example,
did you think the title suggested that it might be demanding? You might have thought that it was important to try and remember
details in case you would need them for an assignment. On the other hand, you might have thought, ‘This might be interesting;
I wonder how it links up with the rest of Learning to learn’? If so, note this in your Learning Journal.

Next, add a second subheading – ‘Approach’ – in your Learning Journal entry. Make some notes under this heading about how
you went about reading and taking notes on the overview.

View comment - Activity 9: Reflecting on the learning theories

Activity 8 required you to use two different styles of writing – academic writing summarising the content of ‘An overview
of learning theories’, and reflective writing outlining those theories’ relevance to your own learning. Activity 9 also required
you to adopt a reflective writing style when making an entry in your Learning Journal. In the next section you’ll explore
these two types of writing in more detail.

2.3 Bringing together theory and personal understanding: The difference between academic writing and reflective writing

One of the aims of this course is to help you to bring academic theory and personal understanding together in interesting
and enriching ways. This, in turn, will require you to produce different types of writing.

To do this, you will need to draw on a skill that you probably already have. This is the skill of adapting communication (in
this case, your written communication) so that it achieves its purpose.

You have already made a start on doing this in Activities 8 and 9, which required you to bring together academic theory and
personal experience. The first part of Activity 8 required you use an academic writing style when outlining the main points
in ‘An overview of learning theories’, discussing something external to yourself (the learning theories). The second part
of Activity 8, together with Activity 9, required you to adopt a more personal style, sometimes known as ‘reflective writing’.

Academic writing

Figure 11 Academic writing

Learning theories are often found in books or journal articles that are read by other academics. These books, articles and
journals tend to be written in an unfamiliar academic style of writing with particular ‘rules’, and this can sometimes be
off-putting at first.

The rules include using referencing to say where the information in the article comes from. Other rules are less obvious,
but they include the need to avoid personal comments. For example, it would be seen as strange if an academic author were
to say (in the middle of an article): ‘I don’t think I have explained that very well. It was because I was worried about my
pet hamster.’ This would be seen as being outside the usual style of academic writing for two reasons:

1. personal issues and concerns are supposed to be separate from academic thinking, which is supposed to represent a sifting
and filtering of the relevant information in a balanced and unbiased way

2. it would be unusual to own up to personal issues and then blame these for some problem with the writing.

Reflective writing

The difference between academic writing and reflective writing can be summed up by thinking about ‘I’. When you are asked
to use an academic approach, it is likely that using ‘I’ in your writing will be less appropriate. However, it is acceptable
to use ‘I’ when you engage in personal reflection. Indeed, it is almost impossible to reflect without using ‘I’.

You may think that whether or not you use ‘I’ is only a small point. By itself, that would be true, but there are some wider
effects. Using ‘I’ gives your writing a very personal ‘voice’. It also is likely to suggest that you are focusing on your
own thoughts, feelings or actions. For example, you might write: ‘I felt confident about asking Joanna for feedback.’ By contrast,
academic writing aims to develop a more detached view of what is being discussed. So you might write: ‘This assignment considers
different ideas about learning.’ To put it simply, if you use ‘I’ in this context, it can make it harder to sound ‘academic’.

2.4 Evaluating learning theories

If the theories you have just read about were new to you, you may wonder how you are supposed to ‘evaluate’ them. Don’t worry
about this. It is important not to accept any form of theory uncritically. Academic progress depends on people challenging
and questioning key beliefs and theories, and suggesting alternatives. However, it is quite possible to begin to engage critically
quite quickly. One way to do this is to bring your knowledge and experience of the everyday world to bear. This enables you
to see if it fits in with how you see the world and to consider what ‘real-world’ implications a theory might have.

We’ll do just this with the theories of Pavlov, Skinner, Bandura and Köhler that you read about earlier in the course in ‘An
overview of learning theories’. Arguably, there are problems with the way these theories view the individual and with their
focus on the environmental factors involved in learning.

The theories in the overview give different roles to the individual – compare the role of Pavlov’s dogs and Köhler’s chimps,
for example. Within each theory, each individual is assumed to be much the same. So neither Pavlov nor Köhler suggests that
there may be dogs (or chimps) that react differently. Even Köhler suggests that all chimps that have reached a particular
stage in their development and find themselves in the same situation (with bananas or termites that can be reached by sticks)
will act in much the same way.

If this is applied to human beings (as done by Skinner), the assumption would have to be that all human beings in similar
situations will experience similar learning.

The second important problem stems from the focus on the role of the environment. Some of the theories suggest that our environments
need to provide particular things at just the right time in order to be able to take our learning forward. For example, Köhler
developed the idea of ‘ripeness’ to describe when the chimps were ready to use a stick to reach the object. If they were not
ready, the stick would go unused and the object would stay out of reach.

This means that for useful learning to take place, the environment needs to fit in with our ever-changing learning. There
are some special environments that aim to be especially tuned in to changing learning needs. These include schools, colleges
and other situations. Similarly, on-the-job training attempts to provide learning that suits those to whom it is given.

The mention of schools and other providers of education should also remind us that the environment includes other people.

Other people are probably the most important aspect of any environment. This is certainly true of learning environments. It
is not a coincidence that the outcomes of school and college evaluations are mainly decided on the basis of the quality of
the work done by the teachers.

However, it may have occurred to you that ‘other people’ are absent from the theories we have been discussing. These theories
do not seem to say much about the importance of other people in our learning. The course You and your learning sets out that other people are important because we can learn from, and with, other people. Other people may even learn from
us. Other people are also important because they get together and form groups. These groups may be quite small or local –
for example, a local dance or salsa club.

So there are areas that do not seem to be covered in the theories we have looked at so far. It is therefore possible to say
that the scope of these theories is limited. This is an important way to think about theory. It is often useful to ask yourself
what the theory covers and what it does not. Once you have worked out the scope of a theory, it becomes much easier to see
whether you need to look elsewhere for a theory that covers some of the aspects that are important to you.

Let’s move on to think about the gaps in the first set of theories that you have studied. These can be summarised as:

- the lack of attention paid to the differences between individuals in how they learn

- the importance of other people in our immediate social and learning environments.

We have noted the importance of other people in the course You and your learning, but this ‘everyday’ evidence does not seem to figure in the theory we have looked at so far. Later in this course, you will
come across theoretical attempts to account for this aspect of learning.

2.5 An alternative perspective: The importance of other people in our immediate social and learning environments

In Section 2.2 you learned about Bandura’s theory of learning through observation or by ‘modelling’. Other people can affect
our learning in many ways, both positive and negative.

Activity 10: Learning from other people

Allow about 10 minutes for this activity.

In the animated films below we return to the story of Tina and her friends Alberto, Mike and Sophie. In the first film we
see Sophie handling a difficult situation in the restaurant, watched by Alberto, who is dining at the restaurant with his
girlfriend. In the second film we see Alberto tackling a different difficult situation.

Watch the two films now and make some notes about what Alberto has learned, how, and from whom.

Video content is not available in this format.

Film 1: Tina in the restaurant

View transcript - Film 1: Tina in the restaurant

Video content is not available in this format.

Film 2: Alberto in the subway

View transcript - Film 2: Alberto in the subway

View comment - Activity 10: Learning from other people

In the next activity, you’ll begin thinking about the people who have been involved in your own learning.

Activity 11: Who’s been involved in your learning and where did it happen?

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity.

The aim of this activity is to encourage you to think about whom you have come into contact with while learning. To complete
the activity you should do the following:

1. Draw a table similar to the example in Figure 12, with the headings ‘Example of my significant learning’, ‘Who was involved?’
and ‘Where did the learning take place?’

2. Choose three examples of your own learning and make notes on each example under the headings you have created, as shown in
Figure 12.

Figure 12 Table showing who has been involved in my learning

You should focus on examples of your learning where you feel you have gained new qualities, knowledge or skills. For example,
you may have learned a new skill when your older sister showed you how to change a tyre. If you have learned to drive, you
may feel that you have learned a skill. You might also feel you have gained knowledge of what a particular road sign means,
for example, and certain qualities, such as being a patient and careful driver.

When you have completed your table, make notes in response to these questions:

1. Did the examples you selected have anything in common? Are they typical of learning that has been important to you?

2. Did your selected examples involve learning from similar people or were they different?

3. Did your selected examples share similar locations or were they different?

View comment - Activity 11: Who’s been involved in your learning and where did it happen?

In the next section you will learn about some learning theories that have acknowledged the role of other people in the learning
process.

2.6 Theories of informal learning

Informal learning includes situations where you involved people without a formal certification to teach you what you learned.
Informal learning is more likely to happen where learning is not the main purpose.

In contrast, formal learning tends to take place when people with special qualifications provide learning at places such as
schools and colleges whose main business is teaching and learning.

Coombs and Ahmed describe informal learning as:

… the lifelong process by which every individual acquires and accumulates knowledge, skills, attitudes and insights from daily
experiences and exposure to the environment – at home, at work, at play: from the example and attitude of families and friends;
from travel, reading newspapers and books; or by listening to the radio or viewing films or television. Generally informal
education is unorganised, unsystematic and even unintentional at times, yet accounts for the great bulk of any person’s total
lifetime learning – including that of a highly ‘schooled’ person.

(Coombs and Ahmed, 1974, p. 8)

The nature of informal learning is that it can happen almost anywhere and involve the widest range of people. For example,
a huge amount of informal learning goes on at work. Boud and Middleton point out that:

There is a diverse range of people that we learn from at work, very few of whom are [recognised] by the employing [organisation]
as people with a role in promoting learning …

(Boud and Middleton, 2003, p. 201)

In contrast, formal learning includes the structured, authorised courses and workshops that take place in dedicated educational
institutions such as schools, colleges and training departments. These units and workshops often include assessments, such
as exams, and lead to certificates, degrees or qualifications.

Being involved with formal learning does not mean that informal learning stops. Coombs and Ahmed (1974) suggest that we are
continually learning. They also suggest that there are other important differences in learning apart from the distinction
between formal and informal learning.

They suggest that we sometimes deliberately set out to learn new things. This is referred to as deliberate learning.

In contrast, other learning may be accidental, occurring as a result of something that has happened. For example, if your
house is broken into, you will learn a lot about how the local police force works. Each experience will be a different mixture
of these different aspects – each will lead to a different form of learning.

2.6.1 A celebrity informal learner

Figure 13 Madhur Jaffrey

Madhur Jaffrey is a good example of someone who has successfully combined learning experiences. Madhur is a best-selling cookbook
writer and television presenter. She has been awarded a CBE (Commander of the British Empire) for her contributions to drama,
culture and cuisine, but as a child she never learned to cook.

Madhur travelled to London at age 19 to study drama. As a student, she desperately missed home-cooked food and wrote letters
to her mother back in India asking her how to cook different dishes.

Madhur’s formal learning was focused on her drama course. However, at the same time, she was informally learning how to cook.
As things turned out, Madhur’s rather unusual style of informal learning was far more important in her life than the formal
learning in her drama course. Madhur has been liberated by her learning. This could be a real contrast with many women whose
learning about cooking can be viewed as formal.

Can you see how some aspects of Madhur’s learning can be seen as individual, others as social? Some of her learning seems
to have been accidental – a result of needing to cook for herself in a new country.

2.6.2 More about formal and informal learning

Karen, one of the Learning to learn case studies, seems to show her own combination of deliberate and accidental learning in the following video clip.

Video content is not available in this format.

Karen

View transcript - Karen

Activity 12: What type of learning?

You should allow about 20 minutes for this activity.

This formal and informal learning activity will help you to develop your understanding of the difference between formal and informal learning, and the possible advantages
and disadvantages of each type of learning. Once again, it features an animated film featuring Tina and her friends.

View comment - Activity 12: What type of learning?

In the next activity you will be required to think about informal and formal learning in the context of your own learning
experiences. You will also learn more about the advantages and disadvantages of different types of learning.

Activity 13: Your learning – Informal or formal?

Allow about 15 minutes for this activity.

To help you see how your learning has involved both formal and informal learning, use the matrix that follows to sort the
examples of learning you identified in Activity 11. Feel free to add more examples.

The matrix has two axes – informal/formal is the horizontal axis, running left to right, and the vertical axis represents
alone/with others, running from top to bottom. This creates four quadrants or boxes:

- Top left: learning informally and alone

- Top right: learning formally and alone

- Bottom left: learning informally with others

- Bottom right: learning formally with others.

Try to find an example of your learning that fits into each quadrant. We have put one example in each box to get you started.
As you complete the matrix, try to recall what each experience was like. Did you enjoy the situation and learn well, or not?

Figure 14 Types of learning

View comment - Activity 13: Your learning – Informal or formal?

The next section of this course explores two further theories. These theories are:

- communities of practice

- student approaches and strategies.

2.7 Communities of practice

Figure 15 Lev Vygotsky

As you have seen in the overview of learning theories, it is possible to view learning as something that happens on a purely
individual basis. There are other types of theories that question this individual focus. There are psychological theories
that suggest learning is an activity that occurs in a particular social context. A good example of this is the theory put
forward by Lev Vygotsky (1896–1934).

According to Vygotsky (1978), learning occurs when human beings take part in activities that are provided by the society in
which they live. You may detect some similarities with Köhler’s theories. However, Köhler tended to focus on an animal’s readiness
to use particular objects to carry out particular tasks. Vygotsky’s ideas are useful because they extend the scope of thinking
about what is used by people as they learn. Although Vygotsky focused on what children need to learn as they grow up, here
we are applying this thinking to the needs of adult learners.

Vygotsky argued that it is impossible to understand learning without taking into account the effect of living in a particular
society at a particular time. One example of this would be the learning that occurred on the Scottish island of St Kilda.
The people who used to live on this island needed to collect eggs and to catch some of the birds that nested on the island.
These were an important source of food for a population that could be cut off from the mainland by bad weather for many weeks.
However, the cliffs where the birds nest often reach more than 1,000 feet above sea level.

Figure 16 Catching birds and eggs for food was a dangerous but important occupation

In order to collect the eggs, St Kildans had to learn how to climb the cliffs. This learning would not have been encouraged
in other societies with other needs. As a young St Kildan grew up, there would come a point where he/she might be taken out
onto the cliffs by a more experienced climber.

Perhaps they would start with parts of the cliffs that were not quite as dangerous as others and gradually progress to the
trickiest climbs. The point is that St Kildan society provided a framework to enable people to develop important skills and
knowledge. This knowledge was held by the society and made available to people as they became ready for it.

2.7.1 More about learning communities

Figure 17 Members of a photography club form a ‘community of practice’

Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) suggest that when you learn, you become involved in what they called a ‘community of practice’.
There are two key words in this term:

- Community is used to suggest a group of people with a common interest. This common interest might be a shared hobby, working for the
same organisation or living in the same place.

- Practice highlights that these people do something together. For example, the St Kildans shared the practice of collecting eggs in
a very dangerous place.

So the concept of a community of practice refers to the learning that occurs when people who have a common interest work together
to share ideas and find solutions. Because people are working together, a community of practice can provide opportunities
to learn how to do something or to improve and do it better. Communities of practice can also act as a kind of collective
store of wisdom and experience. It is not difficult to imagine the St Kildans telling each other stories that would be full
of useful information about, for example, which cliffs were more dangerous after heavy rain.

The features of communities of practice can be summarised as:

- a common or shared interest in something

- a group or community of members who interact and learn together

- shared or collective resources that members have developed over time.

Lave and Wenger point out that communities of practice are widespread and can be found at home, at work or in connection with
leisure interests. Often people are involved with more than one. In the example from St Kilda, you may have noticed that
there seemed to be different positions within the community of practice. The experienced ‘old hands’ were the people who had
developed the essential knowledge and skills. They were the people who passed on what they knew to the younger St Kildans,
who were just beginning to learn about the difficulties and dangers of working on the cliffs. Lave and Wenger suggest that
the people who act as the store of knowledge are central to a community of practice. They are ‘core’ members. There are likely
to be others who are on the edge of a community of practice. These will include those who have only just become involved with
the community of practice, such as the younger St Kildans. But those on the margin of a community of practice could also include
those who are moving out of the community, perhaps through age or ill health. What Lave and Wenger call the ‘periphery’ would
also include those with only a slight or passing interest in the community of practice.

Many sports teams would meet the criteria for being a community of practice, as would local gardening groups. You can probably
think of other examples that also meet the three criteria.

2.7.2 Exploring learning communities

Do you think that our case-study subjects are involved in communities of practice? This comment from Karen suggests that she,
at least, may have found one while she was studying:

Video content is not available in this format.

Karen

View transcript - Karen

Activity 14: Identifying learning communities

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity

This activity about communities of practice will help you to develop your understanding of the ways in which communities of practice work. Once again, it features an
animated film featuring Tina and her friends.

View comment - Activity 14: Identifying learning communities

The next activity is a good opportunity to reflect on how the groups in your own life influence your learning and studying.
By doing this, you are also evaluating the relevance and usefulness of communities of practice as a theory.

Activity 15: Your groups – Are they communities of practice?

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity.

Lave and Wenger suggest that being a member of a group is a key part of learning in general. Such membership might also be
important for your study in Learning to learn. Have you told people that you have started this course? Have you tried to involve them as a result of doing some of the
activities? If you have, think about their responses. Were they positive or were they indifferent? The people might even have
made negative comments about your studies.

Use a table such as that shown in Figure 18. In the first column list the groups to which you belong. In the second column
comment on how these groups support your learning. For example, you might say that your family members have done household
chores to give you time to work on Learning to learn. If they do not know you are studying, you could put in what you imagine their reactions would be. In the third column make
some notes about whether the groups seem to have any of the three features of a community of practice. For example, you might
note that your family members know about three or four easy-to-cook meals that they can produce when you are not able to cook
for them.

Figure 18 Communities of practice, or not

View comment - Activity 15: Your groups – Are they communities of practice?

The other result of the last activity is to give you a clearer idea about communities of practice and to make you think about
the extent to which this concept applies to you at the moment. By seeing how it might apply, you are exploring its relevance
and usefulness. Even if you decided that few or none of your current groups have features of communities of practice, you
will have given yourself the chance to see how these key features may be applied.

2.7.3 A ‘health warning’ about groups

It can be great to belong to a group, especially if you are a highly respected core member. Other people can look up to you
and ask you to share your expertise. The process of moving from being a peripheral member to being a core member can also
be very satisfying. However, groups are sometimes defined as much by whom they exclude. Groups may not just have insiders;
they have outsiders who are not seen as part of the group. Often this may not matter. No one can be a member of every group.
However, being a member of some groups means that there is access to privileges that are denied to outsiders, who may be viewed
as inferior or undesirable.

Figure 19 bell hooks

American author bell hooks (she prefers her name to be given without capital letters) describes the effect of coming from
a class and having an ethnicity that can lead to exclusion:

It was assumed that any student coming from a poor or working class background would willingly surrender all values and habits
of being associated with this background. Those of us from diverse ethnic/racial backgrounds learned that no aspect of our
… culture could be voiced …

I see many students from ‘undesirable’ class backgrounds become unable to complete their studies because [of] the contradictions
between the behaviour necessary to ‘make it’ … and those that allowed them to be comfortable at home with their families and
friends …

(Hooks, 1994, p. 182)

Activity 16: Considering possible problems with group mobility

Allow about 15 minutes for this activity.

Return to course

As bell hooks suggests, sometimes moving from one group to another can be problematic. For example, some people find that
when they go to college their old school friends do not react well to their joining new groups of people and the old friendship
bonds can become weakened. It is also common to find that people have preconceptions about you, based on your identity (for
example, your class, race, religion, gender, profession or town of origin) and for these preconceptions to make it difficult
for you to fit in with a new group of people.

However, it is possible to cope better with these possible hurdles by preparing for them well in advance. This group mobility activity will help you to do so. It involves both reflecting backwards and reflecting forwards.

View comment - Activity 16: Considering possible problems with group mobility

So far in this course, you have looked at learning theories from psychology and at communities of practice. The next section
introduces a third set of ideas – Entwistle’s theory of student approaches to learning.

2.8 Entwistle’s theory of student approaches to learning

Figure 20 Learning to cook can be achieved at many different levels

Noel Entwistle’s ideas are concerned with the ways in which individuals approach learning. They focus on how people go about
learning a body of knowledge. This contrasts with community of practice theory, which is more interested in how groups of
people together create knowledge or understanding, as the St Kildans did about ‘high-rise’ egg collecting.

This might suggest that we are going back to where we started on this course. You may recall that this starting point involved
thinking about yourself as an individual learner. However, here we are encouraging you to think about how reflecting on a
theory can help you understand your learning. We ask you to begin to assess its usefulness and personal relevance.

You may have heard of the term ‘learning styles’. Although learning styles are widely used in both education and at work,
some approaches which use them have been criticised. If you want to find out more about this criticism, see the report Should We Be Using Learning Styles? (Coffield, et al., 2004). Reports like these argue that there is little evidence to back some of the claims made for learning
styles.

We have selected Entwistle’s theory, which has not been criticised in this way, because it is based on evidence that has been
gathered over a number of years. We hope you will find it interesting and useful in extending your thinking about how you
might use learning to achieve change.

2.8.1 Background to Entwistle’s theory

Entwistle’s ideas draw on those of Roger Säljö (1979). In what became known as the Gothenburg study, Säljö interviewed 90
people about their approaches to learning. He found that there were important differences in how people saw their own learning.
He suggested that some had a ‘taken-for-granted’ perspective in which learning was seen as a ‘[memorising] activity where
the task of the learner is seen as that of “getting all the facts into your head”’ (Säljö, 1979, p. 446).

This perspective contrasted with one in which people in the study said that they were ‘becoming aware of the influence of
the context of learning on what you should learn and how you should set about it … they started to try to adapt their learning
to various kinds of demand (teachers, tests …)’ (Säljö, 1979, p. 448). Säljö also points out that learners who use this thematic
approach to learning also thought that there was a difference between ‘learning for life’ and ‘learning in school’. Many saw
learning in school ‘as an activity which to a large extent has become stereotyped and routine … a particular type of learning
… that is not perceived of as being … related to anything outside the school situation’ (Säljö, 1979, p. 449). These thematic
learners also reported that they had started to think about what they learned. As Säljö comments:

[The] main feature [of ‘real learning’] is that it in some way involves the abstraction of meaning from learning materials
rather than a mere reproduction of them. … the nature of what is learned is seen as more complex and more holistic; it is
a perspective, a point of view, an interpretation, a general principle … rather than the plain ‘facts’ which people previously
report having perceived as what is to be learned.

(Säljö, 1979, p. 449)

2.8.2 Entwistle’s theory

Entwistle (Entwistle et al., 2001) has conducted similar research to the Gothenburg study. On the basis of this, he modified
Säljö’s original ideas and suggested that there are three different approaches:

- Surface learning, which is associated with the idea that learning is about acquiring facts. For example, students may try to pass a course
by memorising what they are told. When engaged in surface learning, students prefer to be told what to read and what notes
to take. The ideal exam for someone who has based learning on a surface strategy would be one based only on the information
that a course has provided. Such students are also liable to feel that they are drowning in information that contains many
separate elements, which seem to have few, if any, connections with each other. They struggle to make sense of these ideas.

- Strategic learning, which involves those who are trying to get a good grade in a course by organising their time well, by finding the right
conditions for studying and by putting consistent effort into their studies.

- Deep learning, which occurs when people are more concerned with their own development – they are interested in what the course is about
and are excited by and like sharing new ideas. People engaged in deep learning are looking for meaning in what they study
rather than trying to memorise it. They are curious and questioning, and are constantly examining whether what they are told
makes sense in the light of their past experiences. In fact, by drawing links between different aspects of their learning,
they are better able to make sense of it and therefore more likely to pass the course, as well as developing more fully as
human beings.

2.8.3 Approaches to learning

The three approaches are summarised in the following table.

Approaches to learning

Deep approach: Seeking meaning

Surface approach: Reproducing

Strategic approach: Reflective organising

Intention – to understand ideas for yourself by:

Intention – to cope with course requirements by:

Intention – to achieve the highest possible grades by:

Relating ideas to previous knowledge and experience

Treating the course as unrelated bits of knowledge

Putting consistent effort into studying

Looking for patterns and underlying principles

Memorising facts and carrying out procedures routinely

Managing time and effort effectively

Checking evidence and relating it to conclusions

Finding difficulty in making sense of new ideas presented

Finding the right conditions and materials for studying

Examining logic and arguments cautiously and critically

Seeing little value or meaning in either the course or the tasks set

Monitoring the effectiveness of ways of studying

Being aware of understanding developing while learning

Studying without reflecting on either purpose or strategy

Being alert to assessment requirements and criteria

Becoming actively interested in the course content

Feeling undue pressure and worry about the work

Gearing work to the perceived preferences of lecturers

(Adapted from Entwistle et al., 2001)

Activity 17: Identifying approaches to learning

Allow about 10 minutes for this activity.

This activity is intended to consolidate your understanding of Entwistle’s approaches to learning models. The activity features
an animated film where Alberto and his girlfriend Ellen, whom you’ve encountered in previous activities, discuss their catering
course with a classmate, Janet.

Complete the Identifying approaches to learning activity then return to this section.

View comment - Activity 17: Identifying approaches to learning

The real value of knowing about these different approaches is that it opens the possibility of using different approaches
in different circumstances. Even surface learning may have its uses if you need to learn a lot of new information to pass
a test. Entwistle’s research suggests that when students become more aware of their own approaches, they are in a better position
to decide what they are trying to achieve from their studying, and to understand the implications of adopting deep and surface
approaches to learning.

The next activity is a chance to develop your understanding of Entwistle’s theory and to begin to test its personal relevance.

Activity 18: Deep, surface and strategic approaches to your own learning

Allow about 20 minutes for this activity.

1. Make a table similar to that shown in Figure 21.

2. In the first column, list at least three fairly recent learning experiences you have had. (You could use learning episodes
that you have identified for previous Learning to learn activities, for example Activity 13, or you could select some new examples, perhaps linked to your study of this course.)

3. In the second column, identify the learning approach involved.

4. Now, think about whether you think you could have used an alternative learning approach. If so, then note this possible approach
in the third column.

Figure 21 Learning approaches table

View comment - Activity 18: Deep, surface and strategic approaches to your own learning

2.9 Further reflection on the usefulness of learning theories

In this section you will consolidate your study of the learning theories covered in the course and further consider those
theories’ relevance in the context of your own life and experiences.

Activity 19: Learning theories and their relevance

Allow about 30 minutes for this task.

You have encountered four main theories/sets of theories in this course. These are:

1. Learning theories developed by psychology (Sections 2.2 and 2.4)

2. Ideas about the different contexts of learning; for example, the difference between informal and formal learning (Section
2.6)

3. Communities of practice theory (Section 2.7)

4. Entwistle’s theory of student approaches to learning (Section 2.8).

You also learned about the Johari Window, which is closely grounded in learning theory, in Section 1.4.

Identify the main features of the learning theories you have studied and to consider each theory’s possible relevance in the
context of your own learning in the Learning theories and their relevance quiz.

You should return to this section when you have completed this activity.

Activity 20: Reflecting on the theory activity

Allow about 10 minutes for this activity.

Whether or not you completed the last activity, now would be a good time to further reflect on your feelings about the activities
in Learning to learn.

Make an entry in your Learning Journal with the title ‘Reflecting on activities’. Then, make some notes in response to some/all
of the following questions:

- If you completed the activities, how did you feel before and after you completed it? For example, were you anxious about completing
the activities or did you feel you could take it in your stride?

- If you did not complete the activities, why was this? Do you think you will return to the activities later?

- How do you now feel about the remaining activities in the Learning to learn course?

View comment - Activity 20: Reflecting on the theory activity

It is impossible to guess what you think about the theories and ideas you have met so far in Learning to learn. It is possible to argue that the psychological learning theories are useful. This springs from the fact that they adopt
a basic stance toward learning that suggests we all learn because we all interact with our environment.

This means that learning is not just something that ‘smart’ people do. This can help place our past learning in context. It
can also highlight that some past learning may not have been very useful. So it could underline the need for our plans to
include learning that supports our development rather than getting in the way of it.

With the ideas about different contexts of learning, we are getting much closer to the situations in which learning happens.
Thinking about the detail of these contexts highlights some important issues. There is the issue of other people being involved
in your learning. Sometimes who these other people are and the role they have help to establish whether the learning is formal
or informal.

An awareness of the range of learning contexts seems to be useful in similar ways to the psychological theories. It helps
to emphasise that learning goes on in many different contexts and that we are able to respond to many of these contexts. This
is really another reminder that we have a tendency to learn in whatever social situation we find ourselves. This raises an
interesting question. If we are able to learn freely in some situations, what stops us from learning in others?

You have already begun considering the role of others in the learning process, for example in exploring the communities of
practice theory. If you go on to study Planning for personal change you will have the opportunity to extend your learning on this topic to include the study of online learning communities.
Social learning online is also be the focus of activities in that course.

In the final sections of this course you will extend your study of learning theories by exploring the ways in which studying
these theories has developed your academic and ‘real-world’ skills.

3 Preparing to move on – Connecting theory with skills

This course has been encouraging you to think about using two additional sources to help you prepare for change. The first
of these sources has been other people that you know. The second has been a selection of academic theory that can be linked
to learning. We hope that these have added to your knowledge and understanding of your learning.

Here the focus shifts to gauging how your work with these two sources has used and (we hope) developed a number of your skills.
As you know from your study of this course, the term 'skills' is quite loaded.

It is important to be clear about what types of skill we are talking about here. Learning to learn refers to two different but related sets of skills. The first set is academic skills. The second set comprises those that
you met in You and your learning – communication skills, problem solving skills and the skills involved in being organised. Let’s look at how you may have
used each set in this course.

3.1 Academic skills

We hope that one result of studying this course is that you will feel more confident about using your academic skills. In
this course, these skills include:

- reading for meaning

- note taking

- writing in an academic way that includes different points of view

- selecting and using evidence

- evaluating ideas (including your own plans) and theories, including information found on the web

- thinking about your own learning (reflection).

However, referring to these skills as ‘academic’ creates the risk that they are seen as useful only for a course of study.
In this sense, they might be seen as part of a surface or, perhaps, a strategic approach to learning.

Yet all the academic skills that are listed above can be useful in other situations. For example, when you read something
like a cookbook or a newspaper article, it is likely that you are reading to understand the main points about how to cook
something or about a topic in the news.

There are also situations in real life where you might have to take notes or summarise key points. This occurs in many occupations;
for example, where it is useful to have notes about decisions reached at a meeting. To take these notes, you have to select
which parts of the discussion are important. Although you may have to use written communication in many areas of your life,
it is probably true that writing in an academic style is perhaps the most specialised of these academic skills. For example,
the assignments for a course of study are not the same as other types of writing. They have their own rules, which may include,
for example, the need for an introductory paragraph in an essay or the need to include references indicating where ideas and
quotes have come from. Submitting assignments will give you a clearer understanding of some of these conventions about academic
writing, such as the value of using concise and clear sentences. You are not be expected to learn them all at once. On this
course there are no long written assignments of the sort you will meet if you go on to further, more formal, study.

Activity 21: Reflecting on how you have used academic skills

Allow about 25 minutes for this activity.

This activity is an opportunity to reflect on some of the academic skills that you have used while studying this course. In
order to do this:

1. Select two activities from this course for which you developed new skills.

2. Draw up a table similar to the one below.

3. For each activity, identify and record the academic skills that you used and any other ways you could use those skills.

My academic skills table

Activity from this course

What academic skills did I use?

Are there any other ways I could use this skill?

Activity 8: Exploring learning theories

‘Reading’: I read this a couple of times to really try and understand the key points.

My daughter’s school has just been evaluated. I want to read the report to understand why the school did not do very well.

Activity 8: Exploring learning theories

‘Note taking’: I took notes about what I thought was important in the overview of theories.

I might need to take some notes on the report to explain it to my partner.

View comment - Activity 21: Reflecting on how you have used academic skills

Shehnaz, one of our original case studies, also discusses the ways in which academic skills can overlap with real-world skills,
as shown in this video clip.

Video content is not available in this format.

Shehnaz

View transcript - Shehnaz

You’ll look at ‘real-world’ skills again in the next section.

3.2 ‘Real-world’ skills

Although we are describing ‘real-world’ skills as a separate set of skills, we hope that you can see the value of these skills
in supporting your learning, as well as being important for many other aspects of your life. In this course, we have been
focusing on:

- communication skills

- problem-solving (decision making) skills

- organisational (self-management) skills.

The next activity is similar to the one you have just completed, but here the focus is on the skills that we have labelled
as everyday or real-world skills.

Activity 22: Reflecting on how you have used the three ‘real-world’ skills

Allow about 25 minutes for this activity.

This activity is an opportunity to reflect on how you have used these three skills in this course. For this activity, select
an activity from this course. Again, you are asked to draw up a table similar to the one below. We have included an example.
For this activity, try to include an example of how you have used all three ‘real-world’ skills.

My real-world skills

Activity from this course

What ‘real-world’ skills did I use?

Are there any other ways I could use this skill?

Activity 7: Can you change your Johari Window?

I used communication skills to ask my friend to give me feedback.

I could use the same skills to ask for feedback from someone at work.

View comment - Activity 22: Reflecting on how you have used the three ‘real-world’ skills

The next course can also be viewed as an opportunity to develop a deep approach to your learning.

4 Conclusion

In this course you have explored two aspects of learning:

- The first encourages you to consider the importance of the views of people you come into contact with, as they can give you
additional perspectives. This can be useful because a new perspective can make you stop and reconsider aspects of your learning
in ways that may not have occurred to you. However, these additional views can give you new problems to solve. You have to
decide what you are going to do with this information and how, if at all, it affects the way you see yourself as a learner.

- You have also been encouraged to think about a range of theories about learning. These give you the chance to practise using
academic skills and to see if these theories demonstrate their value in terms of helping you better understand your own learning.

Congratulations you have completed this course!

Keep on learning

Study another free course

There are more than 800 courses on OpenLearn for you to choose from on a range of subjects.

Find out more about all our free courses.

Take your studies further

Find out more about studying with The Open University by visiting our online prospectus.

If you are new to university study, you may be interested in our Access Courses or Certificates.

What’s new from OpenLearn?

Sign up to our newsletter or view a sample.

For reference, full URLs to pages listed above:

OpenLearn – www.open.edu/openlearn/free-courses

Visiting our online prospectus – www.open.ac.uk/courses

Access Courses – www.open.ac.uk/courses/do-it/access

Certificates – www.open.ac.uk/courses/certificates-he

Newsletter – www.open.edu/openlearn/about-openlearn/subscribe-the-openlearn-newsletter

References

Boud, D. and Middleton, H. (2003) ‘Learning from others at work: Communities of practice and informal learning’, London, Journal of Workplace Learning, vol. 15, no. 5, pp. 194–202.

Coffield, F., Moseley, D., Hall, E. and Ecclestone, K. (2004) Should We Be Using Learning Styles? What Research Has to Say to Practice, London, Learning and Skills Research Centre.

Coombs, P.H. and Ahmed, M. (1974) Attacking Rural Poverty. How Nonformal Education Can Help, Baltimore, John Hopkins University Press.

Entwistle, N., McCune, V. and Walker, P. (2001) ‘Conceptions, styles and approaches within higher education: Analytic abstractions
and everyday experience’ in Sternberg, R.J. and Zhang, L-F. (eds) Perspectives on Thinking, Learning and Cognitive Styles, London, Lawrence Erlbaum.

Gross, R.D. (1996) Psychology: The Science of Mind and Behaviour (3rd edn), London, Hodder Arnold H & S.

Hooks, Bell (1994) Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom, New York, Routledge.

Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Säljö, R. (1979) ‘Learning about learning’, Higher Education, vol. 8, no. 4, pp. 443–51.

Vygotsky, L.S. (1978) Mind and Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press.

Acknowledgements

Except for third party materials and otherwise stated (see terms and conditions), this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Licence.

Course image: Chris Calzolaio in Flickr made available under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Licence.

The material acknowledged below is Proprietary and used under licence (not subject to Creative Commons Licence).  Grateful
acknowledgement is made to the following sources for permission to reproduce material in this course.

Figures

Figure 3: Freud iceberg from intropsych.com

Figure 4: 360 degree feedback from www.custominsight.com

Figure 8: © unknown

Figure 9: Pavlov’s dog Raulino Villberg on Vimeo shivaraichandani.blogspot.com

Figure 10: www.nature.com

Figure 13: © John Chapple/Rex Features

Figure 16: © D O’Neil. Reproduced under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation Licence

Figure 17: © Thomas Hawk/Foter.com/made available under Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial licence

Figure 19: © Barron Claiborne/Corbis

Figure 20: © unknown

Johari Window animation: Developed with GoAnimate.com software under terms of licence.

Video featuring Karen, Levene and Shehnaz © The Open University (2008)

Every effort has been made to contact copyright owners. If any have been inadvertently overlooked, the publishers will be
pleased to make the necessary arrangements at the first opportunity.

Return to the Learning to learn course page

Start the next course in the Learning to learn course – Planning for personal change

Find out more about studying with The Open University

Don't miss out:

If reading this text has inspired you to learn more, you may be interested in joining the millions of people who discover
our free learning resources and qualifications by visiting The Open University - www.open.edu/openlearn/free-courses

Activity 1: Identifying feedback

Comment

How did you feel about working from an animation? Did if feel like ‘proper’ learning?

Hopefully you found you could focus on the characters and the interaction between them. You’ll meet Tina and Sophie again
later in the course.

In this film we see and hear about Tina receiving two types of feedback. First, we hear Tina telling Sophie about the feedback
she got from the interview panel. They told her that she was ‘a natural’ at handling conflict. Then, later in the film Sophie
gives Tina some feedback when she tells her that she finds Tina is ‘always so very calm, even when the rest of us are stressed’.

Did you think of any feedback you might give Tina to help in her job hunting? Maybe you thought Tina should be told about
the importance of reading interview preparation instructions. Whatever your views about areas in which Tina might benefit
from feedback, you have now made a start on thinking about how feedback might be useful.

Back

Activity 2: Problems with getting feedback

Comment

Every student of Learning to learn will have written something different in their Learning Journal as a response to this activity. If you struggled to think
of anyone you would be comfortable with asking for feedback, don’t worry – the next section of the course will offer some
alternatives to gaining feedback from real human beings.

Back

Activity 3: The Johari Window

Comment

Don’t worry if it took you several tries to get the correct answers for this quiz. Every attempt will have contributed to
strengthening your learning, prompting you to really think deeply about the ways in which Tina’s Johari Window areas are covered
in the four films. Hopefully you now feel more knowledgeable about the four areas of the Johari Window and how they relate
to the process of giving and receiving feedback.

Back

Activity 4: Responding to feedback

Comment

In this video we see Sophie warning Tina that when she is nervous she sometimes doesn’t pay attention to details such as interview
instructions. Tina seems surprised at this feedback as she hadn’t realised that this was one of her characteristics. The feedback
from Sophie allows her to increase the size of the open area in her Johari Window, while decreasing the size of her blind
area, as she learns something new about herself.

Back

Activity 5: Feedback you have had

Comment

Again, your response to this activity will be very personal. For this activity you were asked to recall receiving feedback
that had a positive impact on your life, and hopefully you were able to think of a time when you received useful and helpful
feedback from someone else. Sometimes, though, feedback can be negative or even undermine confidence in our own abilities,
and it is likely that you will have received this sort of feedback at some point in your life. On the whole, though, it is
clear that we need feedback in order to build a picture of what we are good at and what we could improve on. The best way
to avoid getting negative, confidence-damaging feedback is to choose as your feedback givers people that you can trust and
who have no ‘axe to grind’.

Back

Activity 6: Drawing your own Johari Window

Comment

You should now put your initial Johari Window aside. However, if you think of any additional skills or qualities, you should
add them to your Johari Window.

Back

Activity 7: Getting feedback from someone and changing your Johari Window

Comment

Has the feedback you received, whether real or imaginary, increased the size of your Johari Window open area? If so, did it
also decrease the size of your blind area? If so, you could change the sizes on your existing Johari Window diagram. Perhaps
you decided to reveal something from your hidden area in order to get more useful feedback. If so, then you could change the
size of your hidden area too.

Back

Activity 8: Exploring learning theories

Comment

It would be interesting to think about which task you found easier. Did you find it easier to extract the main points of the
content, or did it seem more straightforward to work out whether it was useful or not?

In terms of content, the overview broadly suggests that there are a number of learning theories that are based on the idea
that the environment ‘makes’ the individual learn.

However, there are some important differences about the way that the theories see individuals. Some (like Pavlov) do not give
much of a role to the individual. By contrast, Köhler suggests that a chimpanzee might have the capacity to solve problems.
It is true that these problems were in the ‘environment’ as were the sticks the chips used – but the chimps’ responses were
not determined just by the environment.

It is harder to guess what you might think about the relevance of these ideas.

A good place to start might be with the idea that learning occurs when we interact with our environment. Taking this view
sidesteps the debate about whether only ‘intelligent’ people can learn – instead, it suggests that we all have to interact
with our environment, so we all learn.

It also seems to imply that these interactions are all different, even unique. This would suggest that our learning is unique
to us. That makes it hard to say that some people are better learners than others. You might also accept that if our environment
is an important (perhaps central) aspect of our learning, then it is important to create environments in which good learning
can occur. If someone’s environment makes him or her feel stupid, then some very unhelpful learning has taken place.

So these theories may be useful when it comes to how our beliefs about ourselves as learners are shaped. These beliefs are
clearly important – if we believe that we are incapable of doing something, it is less likely that we will succeed in doing
it. This ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’ can also work to our advantage if we can have confidence in our qualities, skills and
knowledge.

Back

Activity 9: Reflecting on the learning theories

Comment

Your feelings about reading ‘An overview of learning theories’ will be personal to you. It will be interesting to review them
at the end of this free course, once you have had more experience of reading about learning theories.

Your approach to the task will also be personal to you. Perhaps you felt that you had to read in great detail and make notes
on just about everything. If your notes on the overview are almost as long as the overview itself, it is possible that you
have taken this approach. If you were able to highlight just two or three key points, and connected these to other learning,
then your approach to reading the overview may have been different.

One way to approach a reading task is to use techniques of scanning and skimming. You were asked to read the overview twice.

Your first reading could have used scanning, where you let your eyes run quickly over the text to see what points seem likely
to be important.

The second read through could use skimming. To do this, you return to some of the points you identified in your scan read
and make sure you are clear about them and how they relate to each other.

Back

Activity 10: Learning from other people

Comment

In Film 1 we see Alberto learning from Tina how to handle conflict when he watches her negotiating with a complaining customer
in the restaurant in which she works. In Film 2 we see Alberto putting his learning into action when he applies the things
he has learned from Tina in a new situation – a subway train. Alberto has learned from Tina two techniques for handling conflict:

- repeating what the other person says in order to make them feel their feelings are being taken seriously

- asking the other person what it would take for the situation to be OK for him.

Back

Activity 11: Who’s been involved in your learning and where did it happen?

Comment

This activity is similar to what you were asked to do in You and your learning as part of your evidence gathering. At this point, the focus is different. We are asking you to think about who has been
involved with your learning and where this learning took place.

The example of learning to drive a car was included because it can have many implications for how people live their lives
and even what jobs they can have. But there are different people who may teach us how to do this. We may have lessons from
a qualified driving instructor; we might ask a friend or relative to show us. Either way, other people have to be involved
– if only because we cannot drive a car alone before passing the driving test.

Back

Activity 12: What type of learning?

Comment

Hopefully you were able to identify the different types of learning mentioned by Tina, Alberto, Mike and Ellen when they explained
to their friends how they had learned to dance. Don’t worry if it took you several attempts to complete the quiz. As you already
know, repeating a quiz can help to strengthen your learning, prompting you to think more deeply about the quiz content.

Back

Activity 13: Your learning – Informal or formal?

Comment

All types of learning have advantages and disadvantages.

Formal learning may have the advantage of offering a structure that can be reassuring to learners. For some people, there
is nothing worse than being uncertain about what comes next. Other people find this structure stifling, and relish the opportunity
to explore aspects of a topic in their own way and at their own pace.

It is good to have to have learning opportunities that suit our needs. We may want to get a degree that formal learning might
bring. At the same point in our lives, we may enjoy developing a hobby through informal learning. It is often surprising how
what we learn informally can help us appreciate aspects of formal learning. The opposite can happen, too.

Back

Activity 14: Identifying learning communities

Comment

In the animated film, you saw professional photographer and ill-tempered diner Eric recalling how he learned about photography
and made this his career. Clearly the photography club has been a major influence on his learning throughout his adult life.
However, it’s likely that other groups of people and other individuals have had an impact on his learning. These people may
include his work colleagues at the newspaper and other professional photographers with whom he has come into contact over
the years. Each of these groups of people could be functioning as a community of practice.

Back

Activity 15: Your groups – Are they communities of practice?

Comment

This activity might have reminded you that friends and family can have a big impact on you. They may already have had an impact
on how you see yourself as a learner. This can have an ongoing effect on any subsequent study and on any plans for change.
It might even affect how you view this course. This is fine if you feel supported by the groups to which you belong. But
what if you feel that none of these groups is on your side? Well, we hope that you see Learning to learn as a support that helps build your confidence and belief in yourself. Perhaps one of the things you need to include in any
of your plans for change is finding a group that can be a community of practice as far as you are concerned.

Back

Activity 16: Considering possible problems with group mobility

Comment

Hopefully this activity will have prompted you to further consider the possible impact of belonging to any type of group and
of moving from one group to another. You may have had few problems in doing so yourself. Indeed, some people are very happy
to leave their old groups behind; for example, when they leave home to find work or to go to college. Also some people are
better than others at fitting in with new groups. Whatever your experiences, it would be worth going through the steps in
this activity any time you anticipate joining a new group or moving from one group to another, in order to better prepare
for that move.

Back

Activity 17: Identifying approaches to learning

Comment

Hopefully you now feel more confident about identifying deep, surface and strategic approaches to learning.

You were asked to consider the advantages and disadvantages of each approach to learning. It is clear that Entwistle’s three
categories involve value judgements. The way that some of these approaches are described suggests that some of them are ‘better’
than others. It sounds good to be a ‘deep’ or ‘strategic’ learner; it does not sound so good to be a ‘surface’ learner. However,
Entwistle’s ideas should not be taken as meaning that people fall into one category or another, nor that a particular approach
is inherently good or bad. Indeed, you may have found both advantages and disadvantages for each learning approach.

The key suggestion is that everyone is capable of becoming a strategic, or even a deep, learner. Indeed, we would want you
to use these as your approaches to learning. We think that it is important to use learning for personal change. However, it
is sometimes important to be able to use your learning to pass a course. When you need to pass a course, get a certification
or understand what others are trying to teach you, strategic learning is useful. If you are primarily interested in getting
a certification, deep learning could get in the way. You might get new ideas and be more interested in seeing where they take
you. You could get sidetracked by things you are really interested in, rather than concentrating on the job at hand. If, on
the other hand, your main interest is personal development, deep learning is very useful. (In this course, we try to achieve
a balance and would encourage you to draw on both strategic and deep learning.)

Back

Activity 18: Deep, surface and strategic approaches to your own learning

Comment

We hope that this activity has given you a real feel for the ideas that Entwistle puts forward. You may even have some criticisms
of this approach. For example, you might find it difficult to differentiate between deep and strategic approaches. If this
is the case, then you should see this as being appropriate – taking a critical approach is seen as being a good thing in academic
study.

It is perhaps also difficult to escape from the idea that the deep and strategic approaches are always the most valued. As
we have said, we hope that you will adopt a combination of these two approaches, both as you study this course and as you
begin to think about your own development.

Back

Activity 20: Reflecting on the theory activity

Comment

Again, it would be difficult to guess your responses to the questions above. If you decided not to complete the activities,
at the moment you will have your own reasons for this and may have recorded them in your Learning Journal. If you completed
them you may have said something about how you felt afterwards, or whether it was easier or more difficult than any other
activities you have already completed. Whether or not you completed the activities, it is a great achievement that you have
reached this part of the course.

Back

Activity 21: Reflecting on how you have used academic skills

Comment

Hopefully, completing this activity will help reinforce the idea that so-called academic skills can be useful in other situations,
too.

Developing these skills is not very different from the situation faced by anyone who takes up a new interest. So do not be
afraid about getting it slightly wrong to start with. After all trial and error can be a good way to learn, as long as you
can see some value in making the errors and have the chance to move on from them. It can also help to have support and feedback
from other people, as discussed at various points in this course. For example, the members of a community of practice may
be able to help you in adapting your existing skills for use in a new situation.

Back

Activity 22: Reflecting on how you have used the three ‘real-world’ skills

Comment

We hope that completing this activity will help reinforce the idea that these three skills are transferable – that they can
be used in a variety of different situations. These skills act as an important foundation for many aspects of our lives. They
can even help with learning. They are also the skills that you will be encouraged to use in the next course.

Back

Video 1

Transcript

Tina

Hey, Sophie, it’s great to catch up with you.

Sophie

It’s good to see you too Tina. How are you?

Tina

I’m really good! And I’ve got some great news.

Sophie

What news is that Tina? You certainly look happy.

Tina

You know that job interview I had last Saturday?

Sophie

Yes, Alberto told me about it.

Tina

Well, I was really nervous, but … wait for it … I got the job!

Sophie

Wow! That’s brilliant news Tina. Was the interview difficult?

Tina

It was actually quite enjoyable Sophie. I had prepared a presentation and that seemed to go well.

Sophie

Yes.

Tina

But then they said ‘Now we are going to do a role play where we see how you handle conflict.’

Sophie

Yes. Yes. Were you expecting that?

Tina

That’s the thing. I wasn’t expecting it at all. I had forgotten to look at all of the interview instructions so I hadn’t prepared
anything.

Sophie

Oh dear.

Tina

But that didn’t matter in the end.

Sophie

No?

Tina

No! I did this role play where one of the interview panel played a difficult customer complaining about the service he had
got in a restaurant and I played the restaurant manager.

Sophie

Yes. What happened?

Tina

I seemed to know just how to handle it. They said I was a natural at handling difficult situations. I’ve never ever thought
about whether I’d be any good at dealing with conflict.

Sophie

We know who to call on if there is ever any trouble at college. But seriously, I’m not actually surprised that you handled
the situation so well. You’re always so very calm. Even when the rest of us are really stressed you’re cool, calm and collected.

Tina

Sometimes I don’t feel that way so it’s good to know that’s how I look.

Back

Johari Window

Transcript

Narrator

The Johari Window provides a framework for organising your notes about yourself. This makes the notes much more useful as
the picture this provides can be the basis for helping to decide what you want to do next.

There are two factors at work in a Johari Window. The first factor is what you know about yourself. The second factor is what
other people know about you.

Anything that you know about yourself is part of your open area if you are happy that others know about it too, as in: ‘I
have a positive attitude about change.’

Any aspect that you do not know about is in your blind area if other people have become aware of it without telling you, such
as: ‘They are nervous about speaking in front of large groups.’

There are also things that you know about yourself that you do not want other people to find out about – these are in your
hidden area; for example, ‘I am scared of making decisions in case I get it wrong.’

This leaves just one area. This is the area that is unknown to you or to anyone else: your unknown area.

You can change the balance between these areas. You might decide to tell someone about some aspect of your life that you had
previously kept hidden; for example, ‘I am embarrassed about being a slow reader.’ This would increase your open area and
decrease your hidden area.

It is also possible to increase your open area by asking for feedback from people. This can reduce the size of your blind
area. For example, they might tell you how well you communicate with them. It is also possible to work with another person
to discover things that neither of you had appreciated before. For example, your contact with your tutor might help you both
to have a clearer understanding of the effect that your experiences at school have had on your learning. This would reduce
the size of your unknown area.

So the place to get started is your open area – by being as clear as possible about what you know about yourself already.
The next step is about involving other people – asking them for feedback to reduce the size of your blind area.

Now that you have watched this part of the DVD you should return to complete the activities that involve Johari Windows.

Back

Tina receives some more feedback from Sophie

Transcript

Sophie

Tina, I’ve been thinking about your interview.  You were quite lucky that the interview panel chose an activity you were really
good at.

Tina

Lucky? Why’s that?

Sophie

Well, you said you didn’t read the interview instructions properly. What if they’d been expecting you to have prepared for
a particular task?

Tina

Oh, I don’t know. I’d have probably got by.

Sophie

Not necessarily. I know you’re keen on improving your career …

Tina

Yes, I really am.

Sophie

Well, there’s a danger that your relaxed approach to things like interviews will stop you achieving your goals, especially
if other candidates are very well prepared.

Tina

Yes?

Sophie

Yes! I’ve noticed that sometimes you overlook the fine detail and don’t plan things properly, especially when you’re nervous.

Tina

Really?

Sophie

Yes. And if you haven’t prepared well, or haven’t read the interview instructions properly, you could come across as complacent.
An interview panel might think you’re not taking their job seriously.

Tina

I take your point Sophie. I’d not really realised that my nerves can lead to me not planning properly.

Sophie

No?

Tina

No. In future I’ll look really closely at the instructions I’m given for any job interviews.

Sophie

Yes, you could make a checklist of all the things you need to do beforehand.

Tina

That’s a good idea. Then I’ll know there will be no nasty surprises.  I’ll probably feel more confident that way too.

Back

Film 1: Tina in the restaurant

Transcript

Ellen

Alberto! It’s really lovely in this restaurant!

Alberto

I’m glad you like it Ellen. My friend Tina’s got a new job here and she recommended it.

Eric

Hey! Hey! Get me the manager! The service in this place is awful!

Tina

Hello Sir. I’m the restaurant supervisor. How can I help you?

Eric

I ordered fish and salad but your stupid waiter has brought me steak and fries. I don’t eat meat so I can’t eat my meal. If
I wait for my fish to be cooked I’ll miss my train.

Tina

I’m sorry, sir. Let me get this right. You ordered the fish and salad?

Eric

Yes.

Tina

But the waiter brought you the steak?  Is that right?

Eric

Yes. Yes!

Tina

And you don’t eat meat so you can’t eat your meal?

Eric

Yes, that’s right.

Tina

And finally ... You can’t wait for the right meal to be cooked for you as you will miss your train?

Eric

Yes, that’s it. My train is in 25 minutes. I had just enough time to eat but now I haven’t the time to wait for a new meal
to be cooked and then eat it.

Tina

I’m really sorry, sir. I can understand how you feel. What would make this OK for you?

Eric

Well ... Could you get me a fish burger and fries to go, so I can eat it on the train? And maybe take some money off my meal?

Tina

Of course! That’s not a problem sir!

Eric

Thank you!

Tina

I’ll get your fish burger and fries myself, right away, and reduce your check by 50%!

Eric

Thank you, that’s great!

Back

Film 2: Alberto in the subway

Transcript

Passenger

Hey! Mister! Watch where you’re going! You’ve spilled my drink! you idiot!

Alberto

I’m really sorry!

Passenger

Sorry? Sorry? You’re asking for trouble! I’ve got an important meeting but my shoes are a mess now and I’ve no time to go
home and change!

Alberto

I’m sorry sir. Did I hear you right? I spilled your drink when I bumped into you and it’s gone on your shoes?

Passenger

Yeah, that’s right!

Alberto

And you’re going straight to a meeting and won’t have time to go home and change them?

Passenger

No time at all, dumbo!

Alberto

What would make things OK for you sir?

Passenger

Well, I don’t know. You could buy me a fresh drink at the next station and get me a shoeshine there.

Alberto

OK! That’s a deal.

Passenger

Thank you!

Mike

Alberto. You handled that really well. I thought that guy was going to hit you.

Alberto

So did I, for a while. But I tried to do what Tina did with a complaining customer in her restaurant last evening.

Mike

What’s that?

Alberto

A customer was shouting for the manager because he’d been brought the wrong meal and couldn’t wait for the right meal as he’d
miss his train.

Mike

What happened?

Alberto

Tina handled the situation brilliantly. First she repeated his complaint, I suppose to show she was listening to what he had
to say.

Mike

Yes, then what?

Alberto

He seemed to calm down a bit. Then she asked him what it would take for things to be OK.  The customer seemed pleased to be
asked and said he’d like a meal to go, so he could eat on the train.

Mike

Ah, right. I see!

Alberto

And Tina said that was cool, and said he wouldn’t have to pay for it. The guy seemed happy with that.

Mike

That’s our Tina! I knew she’d be perfect in that job!

Back

Karen

Transcript

I left school when I was 15 and I started work the day after. My qualifications were basically nil. I had no GCSEs. No A levels.
I went to secondary modern school and I immediately got myself a job in an office as an office assistant when I left school.
Three pounds ten shillings a week was my wage then. My first job was a filing clerk and I actually realised that I didn’t
know my alphabet properly, so I actually found a file and I stuck it on the wall. My manager asked me what I was doing at
that time and I admitted I was getting a little bit confused. And he said, ‘Well carry on. That’s a good idea.’ Oh – I would
rather have the files in the correct order rather than have them wrong!

Back

Karen

Transcript

My husband used to proofread because sometimes you get too close to things and you can’t see the wood for the trees. He was
very good at that. My son bought me a memory stick. I'd never used one before he showed me how to use it. My work colleagues
were very supportive throughout. If ever I came back to the office when I was on placement, they would always be very supportive,
‘You can do this. Of course you can.’ The people I was studying with – they were a lifeline. I knew that I could ring them
up and ask them for help, and that they would help me. And exactly the same applied to me, I knew I could contact my lecturer,
and he was only too happy to discuss any problems I had.

Back

Shehnaz

Transcript

Obviously, as my family grew, I had to start to think about how many people were involved in our house and how many people
I was cooking for, things like that. And still having money left over to go and enjoy ourselves as well at the end of the
month. I had to get into a routine to make sure the food was ready on time. That routine is the same kind of thing that you
need to have when you are studying, because you need to set a timetable in order to finish your assignments and get them in
on time.

Before I went back to school, I thought that my life skills and academic skills were completely different, but when I did
go back, I found that what I had learned through life, I could apply to my academic learning to help me succeed in what I
was doing.

Back