Hulse, Deese and Egeth (1975) define perception as a general term that refers to awareness of objects, qualities or events that stimulate organs, and can also refer to a person's experience of the world. Therefore, when someone perceives something through their environment, they learn it and then try to put it into practice.
There are lots of different types of perceptions that are argued to affect learning, such as kinaesthetic, visual and auditory. Kinaesthetic perception is important in many areas of early childhood learning, but as children grow older, most of their learning will take place through visual and auditory perception (Illumine, no date). Moreover, another way these perceptions can affect learners is through the visual aspects and the related skills. Gibson (1966) saw an importance in visual perceptions in his study of optics, textured gradients and affordance. However, he only went as far as to explain 'seeing' but little into assigning meaning and did not look in depth at learning or memory.
Gregory also studied perception. He argues that the topic involves making inferences about what we see and trying to make a best guess. His ideas relate to learning in the classroom as he also found that prior knowledge and past experience are crucial. Therefore, when we visually look at something we are developing a perceptual hypothesis that is not just based on what is in front of us, but relies upon prior knowledge as well.
Apologies for any confusing points I may have made in this...
...but we do have seminar time to go through everyone's blogs tomorrow (on perceptual theories in learning) so hopefully I will gain a further understanding there in the discussions, and possibly be able to add more clarity to my writing here!
@HannahSheltonTT
A good attempt Hannah - well done on teasing out some of the key issues and their context in learning.
ReplyDeletePerception, when discussed in relation to learning, also can refer to our personal constructs, internal filters and personality. So, although you have correctly found that perception means "how do I see the world", the key part to that statement is "I". Each of us have our own internal filters, formed by our experiences and former learning - our nature and nurture. One person's personality might be biased towards interpreting the world from within their own thoughts (introverted), yet another might favour involving others in how they make sense of their world (extroverted). One might tend to focus on what they can see and touch, the other on what their gut instinct tell them, and so on. Is one approach right and the other wrong? Of course no, but it does mean that 100 people might experience exactly the same learning opportunity in 100 very different ways and therefore learn very different things.... and that is what makes adult learning a very wonderful profession to be in!
ReplyDeleteThe issue of how perception affect learning is my seminar presentation I found this article very helpful I was lost. Thanks for giving me direction.
ReplyDeletewhat you see think is what is right but this wrong
ReplyDeletethat's perception
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