50 learning theorists
GREEKS
Socrates (469-399 BC) – method man
Plato (428-348 BC) – lifelong learning, 3Rs, mind & body but ban fiction!
Aristotle (384-322 BC) – science, music and Golden Mean
RELIGIOUS LEADERS
Confucius (551-479BC) 2500 years of order, state, meritocratic assessment
Buddha (6th and 5th C BC) – monasticism to mindfulness
Jesus (7–2 BC to 30–36 AD) – parables, sermons but also dreaded lectures
Mohammed (570AD –632AD) – books, recitation, memorisation and writing
RELIGIOUS ZEALOTS
Ignatius (1401-1556) Jesuit zeal, Latin and child-abuse
Calvin (1509-1564) teachers as preachers, sin and the deficit model of schooling
ENLIGHTENMENT
Locke (1632-1704) –motivation, habit, practice – sceptical on schools & arts
Rousseau (1712-1778) – prickly, paranoid, noble savage
Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-97) – original & radical
PRAGMATISTS
James (1842-1910) – father of modern psychology, develop habits, learn by doing
Dewey (1859 – 1952) – practical, problem-based learning
MARXISTS
Marx (1818-1883) – education for all but the educated became the enemy
Gramsci (1891-1937) – hegemony, intellectuals and informal learning
Althusser (1918-1990) – schools as ISAs and filters for class and labour
Habermas (1929- ): ideology, action but lost on new media
CONSTRUCTIVISTS
Piaget (1896-1980) – ages and stages – but mostly bad science
Vygotsky (1896-1934) – social construction, mediation, ZPD, language, play & special needs
Bruner (1915- ) constructivist scaffolder
BEHAVIOURISTS
Pavlov (1849-1936) education goes to the dogs & the dark side
Thorndike (1874 – 1949) – experimental rigour, transfer and why Latin is a waste of time
Skinner (1904-1990) – radical behaviourism, teaching machines & pigeon guided missile
Bandura (1925 – ) – Bobo dolls, aggression, mirror neurons & video
PSYCHOANALYSTS
Freud (1856 – 1923) therapy culture lives despite being debunked
Erikson (1902 – 1994) lifelong identity crises, 8 stages
Rogers (1902 – 1987) teaching as facilitator
SCHOOLS
Montessori (1870-1952) method, materials and self-directed
Steiner (1861-1925) mysticism, three 7 year stages & eurythmics
Freire (1921-1997) educator & activist
SCHOOLING
Illich (1926-2002) deschooling – school as the ‘new Church’
White (1934 – ) What is education for? Autonomy
Black & Wiliam Don’t praise the child! Formative feedback is key to better learning.
MEMORY
Ebbinghaus (1850-1909) memory genius: forgetting curve, spaced practice, primacy & recency
Miller (1920 – ) Magic number 7 plus & minus 2 – chunking
Atkinson & Shiffrin – three-stage model of memory (sensory, STM, LTM)
Baddeley (1934) complexity of ‘working’ memory
Tulving (1927 – ) Cue memory: episodic & semantic memories and, encoding
Kandel (1929 – ) Nobel Prize winning learning theorist
INSTRUCTIONALISTS
Mager – Mr learning objectives. In this course you will…..yawn, yawn!
Gagne (1916 – 2002) Universal recipe for learning (9 steps)
Kolb – Experience & learning: a 4 stage cycle, also learning styles
Bloom (1913-1999) one e-learning paper you must read plus his
taxonomy of learning
HOLISTS
Maslow (1908 – 1970) Hierarchy of needs. 5 or 7 levels? Useful or
useless?
Seligman (1942 – ) Pied-piper of ‘positive’ psychology but at expense of
realism?
POP PSYCHOLOGISTS
Bandler NLP: No Longer Plausible: training’s shameful, fraudulent
cult?
Fleming VAKuous learning styles?
Honey & Mumford All styles no substance?
ASSESSMENT
Eysenck (1916-1997) Bad ass of assessment?
Gardner Multiple Intelligences or school subjects mirrored?
Kirkpatrick 4-levels of evaluation: Happy sheets? Surely past its sell-by
date?