Gagne’s Conditions of Learning Theory-1

A) Description

Although Gagne’s theoretical framework covers many aspects of learning, "the focus of the theory is on intellectual skills" (Kearsley, 1994a). Gagne’s theory is very prescriptive. In its original formulation, special attention was given to military training (Gagne 1962, as cited in Kearsley, 1994a).
In this theory, five major types of learning levels are identified:

• verbal information
• intellectual skills
• cognitive strategies
• motor skills
• attitudes

The importance behind the above system of classification is that each learning level requires "different internal and external conditions" (Kearsley 1994a) i.e., each learning level requires different types of instruction. Kearsley provides the following example:

for cognitive strategies to be learned, there must be a chance to practice developing new solutions to problems; to learn attitudes, the learner must be exposed to a credible role model or persuasive arguments.

Gagne also contends that learning tasks for intellectual skills can be organized in a hierarchy according to complexity:

• stimulus recognition
• response generation
• procedure following
• use of terminology
• discriminations
• concept formation
• rule application
• problem solving

The primary significance of this hierarchy is to provide direction for instructors so that they can "identify prerequisites that should be completed to facilitate learning at each level" (Kearsley 1994a). This learning hierarchy also provides a basis for sequencing instruction. Gagne outlines the following nine instructional events and corresponding cognitive processes (as cited in Kearsley 1994a):

1. gaining attention (reception)
2. informing learners of the objective (expectancy)
3. stimulating recall of prior learning (retrieval)
4. presenting the stimulus (selective perception)
5. providing learning guidance (semantic encoding)
6. eliciting performance (responding)
7. providing feedback (reinforcement)
8. assessing performance (retrieval)
9. enhancing retention and transfer (generalization)