Four Major Perspectives on Learning and Their Impact on Teaching Decisions

The developments in the area of SLA have been presented simultaneously with the developments in the technology. In other words, the reformed theories in this area have been proposed according to the improvements of the technology. Firstly, behaviorism known as reinforcement theory has been developed relies on solely observable behavior and is more comfortable with explaining sample learning tasks. On the other hand, cognitivists have a broader perspective on language learning than held by behaviorists. This theory aims at creating a mental model of how learners receive, process and manipulate information. It is mostly concerned with the process of thinking, problem solving and making decisions of the learners. Therefore, it wouldn't be wrong to say, this approach to instruction is a more metacognitive approach to teaching the 21st century learners. Afterwards, constructivism has been developed as a movement extending beyond the ideas of cognitivism with the technological developments. This approach targets to make the learners much more creative and engage them in meaningful experiences as the essence of experiential learning, that is, learning by doing. It exactly fits with learning abilities 21st century learners' need. Finally, social psychologists emphasize cooperation rather than competition to improve and facilitate learning. This approach addresses interdependent collaborative abilities, which is an essential requirement for the 21st century learners to use these abilities as part of their learning. From my learning experiences in both high school and preparatory school, it may be said that there were any classroom activities or learning strategies required to implement the last two theories above in the language learning process. I mean, I have never been an independent learner who creates own interpretations of the world of information. Instructors, at that time, would apply teacher-centered techniques, so they have never provided us an opportunity with shifting from passive transfer of information to active problem solving and discovery. Although I was a 21st century learner in preparatory school, I haven't been trained with the theories that provide many opportunities in language learning because of the technological developments. My language training much more depends on the behavirosm rather than the other theories. For example, I was in high school, the teacher would make a compliment on our papers by writing a short note such as ''good, very good, or excellent'' as a reinforcement. It indeed worked on developing my writing skills. Because, I would always want to see the note ''excellent'', so I would try to write better than previous one. I was in preparatory school, we were given such a kind of assignment that helped us develop our such skills as problem solving and making decision. For instance, I remember that the instructor assigned us with the preparing a presentation which was a group work and its topic was free. This assignment fostered us think cognitively and learn cooperatively. What I have learned from these experiences is that teachers need to develop an eclectic attitude in order to be much more effective in their classrooms. I believe that there is no single method in the area of SLA, because of the fact that all methods, theories or strategies should be used as long as they fit the learners' need. As a prospective teacher, I think that my instruction will be based on communicative strategies which provide learners with not only learning language but also using it.