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Home > Reflective Teaching in Secondary Schools > 1. Becoming a reflective professional > 2. Learning > Further reading > Learning processes


  1. 1. Becoming a reflective professional
       1. Identity
       2. Learning
  2.    3. Reflection
  3.    4. Principles
  4.    Observing [supplementary chapter]
  5.    Enquiry [supplementary chapter]
  6.    Mentoring [supplementary chapter]
  7.    Techniques of enquiry
       [supplementary chapter]

  8. 2. Creating conditions for learning
  9.    5. Contexts
  10.    6. Relationships
  11.    7. Engagement
  12.    8. Spaces

  13. 3. Teaching for learning
  14.    9. Curriculum
  15.    10. Planning
  16.    11. Pedagogy
  17.    12. Communication
  18.    13. Assessment

  19. 4. Reflecting on consequences
  20.    14. Outcomes
  21.    15. Social justice
  22.    Judgement
       [supplementary chapter]

  23. 5. Deepening understanding
  24.    16. Teacher expertise
  25.    17. Professional learning
  26.    18. Professionalism
  27.    Starting out [supplementary
       chapter]
  28.    Improvement [supplementary
       chapter]

Learning processes

Reflective Teaching offers an account of three major approaches to the study and understanding of children’s learning – behaviourism, constructivism and social cognition. These ideas are often covered in most introductory texts on learning, however, direct study of original texts is always worthwhile and some suggestions are offered below:

For some classic behaviourist work see:

  • Skinner, B. F. (1953) Science and Human Behaviour, New York: Macmillan.
  • Gagné, R. M. (1965) The Conditions of Learning, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

For Piaget’s classic constructivist work, see:

  • Piaget, J. (1926) The Language and Thought of the Child, New York: Basic Books.
  • Piaget, J. (1950) The Psychology of Intelligence, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

A comprehensive introduction to Piaget's work is:

  • Ginsberg, H. and Opper, S. (1969) Piaget's Theory of Intellectual Development, New York: Prentice Hall.

However, for an important critique of Piagetian theory see:

  • Donaldson, M. (1978) Children's Minds, London: Fontana.

Most theories of social cognition can be traced back to the work of Vygotsky:

  • Vygotsky, L. S. (1962) Thought and Language, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
  • Vygotsky, L. S. (1978) Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
  • Daniels, H. R. J. (2008) Vygotsky and Research. Abingdon: Routledge.

Others, including Bruner, offer key insights into the significance of learners’ cultural and social contexts in influencing understanding:

  • Bruner, J. (1990) Acts of Meaning. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (Reading 11.1)

Two important books with an emphasis on socio-cultural factors are those by Rogoff and Wenger. Wells and Claxton present international perspectives on the ideas and challenges raised by a socio-cultural perspective of learning, in a modern world that is characterised by complexity and uncertainty:

  • Rogoff, B. (1990) Apprenticeship in Thinking, New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning and Identity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Wells, G. and Claxton, G. (Eds) (2002) Learning for Life in the 21st Century: Socio-Cultural Perspectives on the Future of Education, Oxford: Blackwell.

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