Reflection on Learning what to Learn
Acquiring and utilizing learned information is one of the abilities and skills that enable humans to adapt and survive in the current environment. Learning is a lifelong process; as such, I conquer with Rachel Wu (2019) that efforts need to be placed to ensure that only relevant information is learned to avert possible wastage of time and energy. Knowing what to learn or ignore is crucial as it enables people to understand the main goals of learning. With this understanding, they can channel all efforts to ensure that they acquire the needed information. According to the author, there are at least methods which can enable people to learn what is necessary, while leaving out the irrelevant knowledge (Wu 392). These different methods can be applied to all age groups, but some are very effective when used in particular stages of human lives.
Learning from stimulus characteristics is particularly useful in infants. It mainly entails learning by observing similarities in events or patterns. I consider knowing what to learn by stimulus characteristics to be the most important of the four methods. Although children and infants are known to have high success rates by using this, the process can also be applied seamlessly by adults. As the adage goes, experience is the best teacher. Learning through experience can vary depending on a person. However, I consider it to be less costly. Such means that nearly everyone in the world, regardless of their income levels, can be able to utilize this. Other ways of knowing what to learn include learning from people, learning from reinforcements, and feedback. Another way is through learning from previous knowledge; however, I consider this to be closely related to learning stimulus characteristics or experience since prior knowledge is formed after an interaction with a given object or event.
Regardless of the method of knowing what to learn that one uses, I believe understanding the age of a person is critical before using any method. Infants, children, adults, and mature all have different psychological powers (Wu 394). Furthermore, these different age-groups have different goals in their lives. For children and infants, they can be considered to be still developing and are curious about the new world (Wu 392). As such, while it is essential to encourage them to learn by themselves through the different stimulus characteristics, learning from people is extremely important as they need this guidance. One the other hand, adults have a vast experience in the environment, and thus, their main aim of learning might be goal-directed as they understand the direction they want to choose in life. Such demands that they incorporate nearly all of the four methods in their bid to understand what to learn. Although these four methods help in ensuring that people know what to learn, more studies need to be done to ensure that cognitive and interventions are also understood (Wu 395). The main reason for this is learning eventually adds and depends on our cognitive abilities.
As the author contends, learning irrelevant things can result in wastage of time, energy, and even costs. Understanding this is very important, especially when looking at the long-term outcomes of learning. Although the author presents basic examples of the importance of knowing what to learn, I believe that experiences in colleges and universities can provide more information about the significance of this. It is not uncommon to hear that a student pursues a given course, and after graduating, they soon realize that it was not the right course for them. Such shows that they failed to foresee and relate their future with what they are learning at the moment. As such, I believe that having an understanding of future goals and objectives can also be a way in which people can understand what knowledge to learn.