Behaviorist Theory

a) How would you define successful mastery of your lesson
objectives from a behavioral view of learning? From a social cognitive view of
learning?

      From a behaviorist standpoint mastery of a lesson would stem from being able to measure that a specific behavior has been changed. For example if we were working on learning to subtract in my first grade classroom to check their mastery I would have to see specific behavioral change. To see this I would probably use a worksheet or quiz assessment to see their progress. This would mean that I would need to have tested them before we learned the lesson and then afterwards. If students were able to complete the worksheet or quiz successfully then I would know that they had mastery over the lesson. A social cognitive view would not need such cold facts. As a social cognitive I could do more of a relaxed assessment and listen to my students or watch them as they think through the lesson. I would know that not all learning comes from seeing a behavior change. It would be easier to use behavioral mastery of lessons on subjects like science, math, and spelling. Whereas it would be really difficult to use these techniques on reading or social studies. With these type of assignments I would rather use a social cognitive approach to look for learning. For example with reading many times students are required to do words per minute tests to determine if "reading" is occurring. The problem is just because a child can read words quickly without mistake doesn't mean that they are understanding the material in front of them. They may be "reading" quickly but does that mean that they are actually "reading"? So a behaviorist would have their proof based on the students score but a social cognitive would be able to actually look and see if the student was understanding the meaning behind their readings. 

      I guess it is obvious to see that I don't agree with behaviorist view of master of a lesson. I just think there is more than just a behavioral change in learning. I don't think that everything can be assessed by giving a quiz or similar assessment. Many times I feel like school has been over tested and kids have learned how to beat the system and because of that actually learning has decreased.