I was bit simplistic in my explanation of my understanding of learning
levels. Initially people are unaware of their environment. Through pairing
behaviors with rewards babies begin to understand that if they cry then a
familiar figure arrives. They have made a connection that doing something
gets something. Because this person that arrives has something called
language the baby then begins to imitate this language. Soon the baby is
pairing certain words with certain objects or events in the environment.
Calling something a bottle and getting food can result in milk, juice, water,
similac or what have you. Making simple connections that have a one-to one
correspondence is what I understand to be level 1 learning. Adults do this
as well. For instance, if I go walking in the woods I will call many things
a tree. A horticulturist would certainly have a different understanding of
the same trees. Once the baby can make one-to one corespondences they may
begin to put together that aafter lunch they go to the park. A toddler who
makes this connection will operate in a way to indicate they understand this
connection. My understanding is that putting this sequence together is level
2 learning. Most people operate within level 2 learning in their daily
lives. The alarm goes off we perform our morning ritual. We tune into our
favorite radio station on the way to work and so on. We are learning during
this time becasue of our interaction with the environment, we are following
the flow of traffic. We may decide to make a move if traffic is extremely
heavy on our usual road and so on. Our behavior is based on sequences and we
are behaving in regards to the expectations we place on these sequences.
Level 3 learning is when we can possibly predict future events based on these
sequences. If for instance it snows and we know that our usual drive to work
is going to be slow we can change our routine ahead of time. Hopefully, I
have explaqined my understanding of learning levels to do Skinner proud,
probably not Engstrom, however.
What do you think?
Eric
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