[Neurons] 2015 "Neurons" Meta Reflections #27

[L. Michael Hall]

From: L. Michael Hall

Meta Reflections #27

June 22, 2015

Learning #3

 

THE CRITERION OF LEARNING

 

How Do You Know that You Have Learned?

 

 

When I went to the "University of the Public Library" (see the last Meta
Reflection, #26) and got my education in therapy (not my schooling, that
came later), even before my training in NLP, I knew that the proof of the
learning would be in the skills of competency.  I knew that the question
would then be: "Could I translate what I was learning conceptually into good
practice so that I could facilitate the healing, empowerment, and
mindfulness of clients?"  If I could not, had I really learned what I
thought I was learning?  If I could, then what I was discovering and
learning in concept and principle was somehow becoming effective practice.
Even today these are key questions about learning:

           How do you know if you have learned something?

           How can we measure "learning?"

 

Nearly every "school" deceives you and me in answering these questions.
Most schools use grades as their way to measure learning.  "If you make the
grades, then presto, you must have learned!"  Of course, today we know that
a person can learn "how to take a test," and how to develop testing
competency, without actually being able to demonstrate what they supposedly
learned.  Others use degrees, certificates, diplomas, etc. as measurements
of learning.  They are also wrong.  Degrees and certificates do not measure
"learning," they measure test-taking, jumping through hoops, meeting
expectations of teachers, getting along with others, playing a political
game, etc.

 

So what is the true measurement of learning?  Doing.  If you cannot do, if
you cannot perform the practices of a learning, if you cannot turn the
concept into a competent performance- then you have not truly learned.
Doing demonstrates the practicality and reality of learning.  That's why in
Neuro-Semantics we constantly talk about the Knowing-Doing gap and how to
close that gap so that what you know you can do.  This is the meaning of the
Meaning-Performance axes that then generates the Self-Actualization
Quadrants.

 

This was the test I began using when I started by third career of modeling
human experiences of excellence.  I began with Resilience.  That was my
first modeling project.  I studied it for almost three years.  But studying
it, researching it, modeling it would have been insufficient.  The test of
that learning- "Would I be resilient in the face of life's set-backs and
knock-downs?"  "Could I, or would I, bounce back after a set-back with
resilience-with hope, determination, inspiration, etc.?"  The test would be
in the doing.

 

Similarly, I used the same criterion of learning for the other
studies-selling, leadership, negotiation, coaching, business,
self-actualizing, etc.  This reveals that all true learning is experiential
in nature.  It begins with what you can visualize, or say, or imagine, but
it always leads to a kinesthetic engagement and practice.  It always
involves embodying the learning in practice, in getting high quality
feedback from people who can make quality distinctions, and a deliberate
practice of those details that make a difference.

 

So, how do you know if you have learned?  Your behavior will be different,
that's how!  Your actions are more refined, more developed, more thorough,
more expansive, more flexible, etc.  If you have truly learned-you can now
demonstrate your learning.  If you have thoroughly learned, you can
demonstrate it at anytime and any place.  You are now the master of that
competence.  You not only can talk about it, you can show it in your
actions.  You are now able-to-respond appropriately and adequately.  And
that means you are a responsible learner.

 

With this criteria, competency measures true learning.  If you cannot do,
you have only intellectually comprehended the subject, you have not learned
it in your body. Performance is the true test.  For this reason we set out
in Neuro-Semantics to establish benchmarks for competencies in all of the
things that we "teach" and that we "learn."  The behavioral benchmarks
measures both the quantity and the quality of the learning performance.  The
benchmark also tells a person where he is on the scale of that performance
and what his next steps are.

 

"Learning" without the ability to do, to take effective actions, and to put
into practice actually perpetuates one of the central problems with this
kind of insufficient learning.  It widens the Knowing-Doing gap.  You are
filling your head with more intellectual understanding without activating
your body to be able to do the actions of that understanding.  In the long
run, this will undermine your competence, and then your confidence, and then
your enjoyment.

 

If performance is the ultimate criterion of learning, then learning is
inherently and inevitably experiential and why we emphasize hands-on
learning via trainings and coaching.  Then you can give it a go, test it
out, and see how much you can do at any given point.  To the unleashing of
your highest and best learnings!

 

 

 

 

 

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

               Neuro-Semantics Executive Director 

               Neuro-Semantics International

P.O. Box 8

Clifton, CO. 81520 USA                             

               1 970-523-7877 

                    Dr. Hall's email:
<mailto:meta at acsol.net\hich\af31506\dbch\af31505\loch\f31506> meta at acsol.net


    

    

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Self-Actualization: Neuro-Semantics launched the New Human Potential
Movement in 2007, for information about this, see
<http://www.self-actualizing.org/> www.self-actualizing.org  

 

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