Week 2-1 Post

1. Leave a 30-word micro session summary.

 According to Bandura, social cognitive theory involves observing, retaining, and replicating behavior given multiple models. Reciprocal determinism is a theory that explains three factors that influence behavior: personal, social/environmental, and behavioral factors. 

2. What is learning from the social cognitive theory perspective?

Learning occurs when someone pays attention to a behavior, retains it, and then reproduces it. Learning also involves being motivated to learn and carry out the behavior. Motivation is influenced by self-efficacy, which is the belief in one’s capabilities to execute some goal. Learning is influenced by the interaction between one’s behaviors, personal factors (e.g., self-efficacy and interest), and environment. Learning is strongly connected to modeling. 

3. What are the big things that you learned about social cognitive theory & motivation theories (self efficacy theory and self-determination theory)?

I found it very interesting to learn about the different sources of self-efficacy. I thought of so many applications to my own experiences. For example, mastery experiences are when past successes and failures influence self-efficacy in future, similar situations. If I do really well on the first exam in a class, I have high efficacy going into the second exam. Also found vicarious experiences interesting. This increases efficacy because you are seeing other people succeed on a task that is similar to the one you face. I prefer to work alone and don’t necessarily like talking about grades or GPAs with others. However, if I hear people say they did really well in a class, I’ll be a lot more confident going into that class than if I heard a lot of students did poorly. Social cognitive theory and motivation theories make me think about how much our peers influence our behavior and learning, even in the smallest of ways.

4. Do you think social cognitive theory demonstrates your own beliefs in how human learning occurs well? If so/not, why?

I agree with Bandura that people learn through observing and modeling. Especially for classes such as math and science, providing models for students is extremely important. However, using social cognitive theory can be challenging for a teacher because much of the learning occurs internally and is not necessarily observable. This makes me wonder the best way to evaluate students using this theory. Also, it seems simplistic to assume that all behavior is observation and modeling. A teacher can model a behavior, but what factors influence whether or not students observe and model it the same way?

5. Do you have any questions or concerns about course learning?

This week I don’t have any questions or concerns. Looking forward to the rest of the course!

6. Week 2-1 Activity Completion Check

(Copy and paste the table below into your blog refection)

	Modules	Topics  & Activity	Check ✓ if Completed
Week 2	Week 2-1 *Due by July 24 at 10:59 am	1) Week 2-1 Reading Quiz	✓
		2) Week 2-1 Discussion Forum: one initial response & two peer feedback replies	✓
		3) Week 2-1 Personal Blog Reflection	✓

#7. Social Blog Activity

Marissa Morris’s Blog

Hi Marissa,

I really liked how you explained learning from the behaviorist perspective. You mentioned how this perspective focuses on “visible” behavior, which is important to note because unlike other perspectives, behaviorism only focuses on behaviors you can observe.

Also, I completely agree with you that behaviorism has applications to the classroom, but it may not always work for learning. I said the same thing in my reflection! There are so many factors that influence student learning that one perspective isn’t enough.

Thanks for sharing your ideas!

-Elizabeth

Courtney Eaton’s Blog

Hi Courtney,

You did an excellent job explaining the complexity of how behaviorism can lead to learning and facilitate change. I really enjoyed watching the Ted Talk by Jeni Cross. I like how she said that we can’t just educate people to make them change their behavior. You need to present the information in a tangible way. One effective way to do this is social interaction. Maybe we can apply this to the classroom. Instead of teachers providing feedback by writing notes on papers or exams, they can have one-on-one meetings with students throughout the semester. This is one of the reasons why I think office hours are effective at colleges.

I think understanding how to convey information, combined with proper reinforcement and punishment, can be an effective way to teach. Thanks for sharing your ideas!

-Elizabeth O’Brien