Ania Lian (ania@lingua.arts.uq.edu.au)
Sat, 20 Feb 1999 15:44:18 +1000 (EST)
Date: Sat, 20 Feb 1999 15:44:18 +1000 (EST) From: Ania Lian <ania@lingua.arts.uq.edu.au> Subject: Re: Some random comments
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> And Ania, is my thrill of learning the same as achievement? You raise a
> good point about achievement, but my point is that learning, and knowing
> that I am learning, is the prime motivator.
I agree. As to the terms used, we do not know that we are learning unless
we see that our efforts take us somewhere. That moment of realisation I
would call achievement. And this moment of realisation I see as highly
motivating, a kind of 'I am going somewhere'.
> Is this the same as the Ben
> Franklin rule? I don't think so. All persons can learn something,
> perhaps not the same things. Education should be about maximizing
> potential, shouldn't it? This is different from motivation promoted from
> the outside via extrinsic motivators (flash, glitz, mtv, etc.).
Yes, however, the relationship between the efforts directed at maximising
the potential and the realisation on the part of learners that this is
exactly what happens is complex. The B. Franklin example, to me, tells us
less about the kinds of motivations that we are supposed to have and more
about the teaching-learning relationship. The issue of concern here, to
me, is the sources of legitimisation that are employed in the process of
justification of what is good for learners and the sources of
justification that learners' mobilise in the proces of their assessment of
their success and hence the question whether they are truly learning. In
short, I think that in order to avoid reducing learning to the processes
which are within our grasp, the direction taken toward the goal of
maximising potential cannot escape some fundamental questions about
the sources of the goals that underpin our environments.
Your article on learning strategies I would read as a integral component
of that process of reflection.
with best wishes,
Ania Lian
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