School Didactics And Learning: a school Didactic Model Framing An Analysis of Pedagogical Implication of Learning Theory

II
SCHOOL DIDACTICS AND PEDAGOGICAL
IMPLICATIONS OF LEARNING THEORY

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4
Analysing Learning Theory—Its Aim and Design
INTRODUCTION
The aim of the second part of this study is to investigate the cognitivist theory of learning with respect to its
pedagogical implications. This part of the study is to be conceived as a clarification of the presented
pedagogical model; if pedagogical practice aims at affecting an individual’s possibilities of reaching
competence through the process of learning, then it is reasonable to expect that the theory of didactics
recognizes the problem of learning.
In the descriptive model presented earlier, learning theory is accepted as having a prescriptive function. The
idea is as follows: Firstly, teachers’ knowledge of human learning (learning theory) may play a part in
pedagogical practice as a teacher may reflect analytically on what it means to attain some specific
competence. Then, such reflection may influence the teacher’s decisions on how they organize, carry out
and evaluate the TSL process. In doing so the teacher reflects analytically and acts in a prescriptive fashion;
“if acquiring competence ‘X’ means ‘Y’, then one should do ‘Z’ in order to facilitate the reaching of that
competence”. Secondly, for the exact reason presented above it is important to carry out didactic research
on what kind of pedagogical implications different theories of learning have.
THE SCHOOL DIDACTIC MODEL AND THEORY OF LEARNING
It was claimed that learning theory is often understood as having a prescriptive function according to the
type: “if human learning is consti tuted in the form of ‘X’, then teaching must proceed in accordance with
this”. Models of teaching solely based upon such reasoning were criticized as being too narrow in their
approach. Yet it is clear that every theory of teaching must relate to human learning in one way or another.
The question then is what role learning theory has in the descriptive model developed in this study.
The general position adopted here is that we may investigate pedagogical implications emanating from
learning theory within the frames of the present school didactic model. Prescriptive pedagogical propositions
may thus be developed within the framework of an otherwise analytic model. By letting the presented
didactic model frame the present analysis, it is obvious that the development of prescriptive principles on
the basis of psychology only forms a limited part of didactic research. It also clearly shows that the
prescriptive principles developed should not be mixed up with the theory of didactics.
When learning theories are investigated in order to discover the implications of a certain approach, this may
be called descriptive research in didactics. Then, recommending methods and applying such
recommendations will constitute prescriptive, value-bound activity.

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When didactics is considered the conceptual frame for the TSL process, it means that learning is
problematized to the extent that this is reasonable from a didactic point of view. In other words, we should
not ask what the implications of learning theory for pedagogical practice are unless we have an idea of how
pedagogical reality is constituted in the first place, and how this reality should be approached scientifically.
This means that we can approach learning theory from several different perspectives within didactics. For
example, we could ask whether learning theory can help us with the problem of choosing contents in
education; we may also consider what view of mankind different theories represent and then decide whether
this view is consistent with our educational values. Psychology of perception and cognition may also be
helpful when we have to decide how the educational content is to be represented in pedagogical situations.
The point of this reasoning is to show that by starting from didactic theory, by subordinating psychology to
education, we use pedagogical problems to guide us in turning to other disciplines.
It is, however, important to remember that methodical or instructional advice based on psychology
cannot be limited to instructional techniques or methods expected to be used by the teacher. An explication
of the nature of human knowledge represented by learning theory is also relevant. The reason is simply that
the teacher must be able to identify changes in an individual’s competence in different areas in order to
proceed with his work.