The following passage comes from the book Freedom to Learn for the Eighties By Carl Rogers. Rogers, was an important figure in the development of psychotherapy in the twentieth century, and also in the field of education. His views on learning from direct experience have much in common with Buddhist teachings, although the ethos behind some aspects of his work is different. In the passage quoted, we gain a flavour of Rogers' passion for learner-led experiences, his energy for experimentation and his belief in the trustworthiness of people and of the processes of human enquiry.
What Is Learning?
Dr Carl Rogers
If the purpose of teaching is to promote learning, then we need to ask what we mean by that term. Here I become passionate. I want to talk about learning. But not the lifeless, sterile, futile, quickly forgotten stuff that is crammed into the mind of the poor helpless individual tied into his seat by ironclad bonds of conformity! I am talking about LEARNING - the insatiable curiosity that drives the adolescent boy to absorb everything he can see or hear or read about gasoline engines in order to improve the efficiency and speed of his cruiser. I am talking about the student who says, "I am discovering, drawing in from the outside, and making that which is drawn in a real part of me.', I am talking about any learning in which the experience of the learner progresses along this line: "No, no, that's not what I want"; "Wait! This is closer to what I'm interested in, what I need"; "Ah, here it is! Now I'm grasping and comprehending what I need and what I want to know!" This is the theme, the topic, of this book.
TWO KINDS OF LEARNING
Learning, I believe, can be divided into two general types, along a continuum of meaning. At one end of the scale is the kind of task psychologists sometimes set for their subjects - the learning of nonsense syllables. To memorize such items as taz, ent, nep, art, lud, and the like, is a difficult task. Because there is no meaning involved, these syllables are not easy to learn and are likely to be forgotten quickly.
We frequently fail to recognize that much of the material presented to students in the classroom has, for the student, the same perplexing, meaningless quality that the list of nonsense syllables has for us. This is especially true for the underprivileged child whose background provides no context for the material with which he is confronted. But nearly every student finds that large portions of his curriculum are for him, meaningless. Thus, education becomes the futile attempt to learn material that has no personal meaning.
Such learning involves the mind only. It is learning that takes place "from the neck up." It does not involve feelings or personal meanings; it has no relevance for the whole person.
In contrast, there is such a thing as significant, meaningful, experiential learning. When the toddler touches the warm radiator, she learns for herself the meaning of a word hot; she has learned a future caution in regard to all similar radiators; and she has taken in these learnings in a significant, involved way that will not soon be forgotten. Likewise the child who has memorized "two plus two equal four" may one day in her play with blocks or marbles suddenly realize, Two and two do make four!" She has discovered something significant for herself in a way that involves both her thoughts and feelings. Or the child who has labouriously acquired "reading skills" is caught up one day in a printed story, whether a comic book or an adventure tale, and realizes that words can have a magic power which lifts her out of herself into another world. She has now "really" learned to read.
Another example is given by Marshall McLuhan. He points out that if a five-year-old child is moved to a foreign country and allowed to play freely for hours with her new companions, with no language instruction at all, she will learn the new language in a few months and will acquire the proper accent too. She is learning in a way which has significance and meaning for her, and such learning proceeds at an exceedingly rapid rate. But let someone try to instruct her in the new language, basing the instruction on the elements that have meaning for the teacher, and learning is tremendously slowed, or even stopped.
This illustration, a common one, is worth pondering. Why is it that left to her own devices the child learns rapidly, in ways she will not soon forget, and in a manner which has highly practical meaning for her; when all of this can be spoiled if she is "taught" in a way that involves only her intellect? Perhaps a closer look will help.
A DEFINITION
Let me define a bit more precisely the elements that are involved in such significant or experiential learning. It has a quality of personal involvement - the whole person in both feeling and cognitive aspects being in the learning event. It is self initiated. Even when the impetus or stimulus comes from the outside, the sense of discovery, of reaching out, of grasping and comprehending, comes from within. It is pervasive. It makes a difference in the behaviour, the attitudes, perhaps even the personality of the learner; it is evaluated by the learner. She knows whether it is meeting her need, whether it leads toward what she wants to know, whether it illuminates the dark area of ignorance she is experiencing. The locus of evaluation, we might say, resides definitely in the learner. Its essence is rewarding. When such learning takes place, the element of meaning to the learner is built into the whole experience.
(Rogers 1983 pp18-20)
