This book, titled "The Psychology of Learning and Teaching," covers several units all focused on learning and its related aspects. The author has given special attention to the topic of learning and its importance for individuals and groups, whether they are teachers or learners. If you contemplate one's life, you will find that learning holds a significant and continuous place throughout different life stages. A child is born with a few reflex actions like sucking, swallowing during feeding, crying, and movements of hands and feet, as well as excretion processes. All these actions are inherited, not acquired. However, the child soon learns many different movements and behaviors, both simple and complex, through subsequent stages of life.

We have all gone through these life stages, each of us learning language, habits, inclinations, attitudes, values, skills, arts, crafts, and various sciences. In our learning, we did not only learn the right or desirable things, but we might also learn undesirable habits from the community and even patterns of behavior involuntarily. When we entered school, we learned many aspects of behavior from the teacher or peers. One might learn many normal or abnormal habits and traits without any control over it. The surrounding social conditions might be a reason for learning these behavior patterns, or there might be other reasons. But we all learn, in different ways and methods.

Given the great importance of learning in all our lives, psychologists have paid great attention to studying the learning process through scientific and experimental studies. Their research has led to the discovery of the most important principles of learning, which we will study later in this book. We will learn about many methods through which we can teach our sons and daughters desirable, normal behavior and improve their performance in the learning process.

Undoubtedly, every student faces many problems in their life journey, varying in nature, elements, and participating parties. Therefore, they always seek to acquire appropriate knowledge, skills, and attitudes that enable them to face challenges and solve related problems, whether cognitive, social, emotional-axiological, or practical related to motor skills required of them. Paying attention to solving students' problems has a direct impact on the other components of the teaching-learning process: objectives, content, methods, and activities, and consequently, affects the student, who is the focus and primary goal of the educational process.

The author has decided to include twelve units in this book, all discussing learning in all its forms, shapes, and contents. The dear reader will find below the content of each unit of the book as follows:

• First: This book starts from the general framework to explain learning, its origin, impact, and importance. Therefore, the first unit will include a number of basic concepts related to: what is mentioned in the Holy Quran and the noble Sunnah of Quranic verses and prophetic hadiths that refer to learning, its nature, and methods. The emergence and development of the psychology of learning, the importance of studying learning, its goals, and topics. The definition of learning, its characteristics and types, the types of learning, the educational situation, how to study the learning process, and its experiments, as well as methods of measuring learning and its curves.
• Second: The discussion of the physiological bases for the formation of human behavior includes three main dimensions: The main physiological mechanisms responsible for shaping behavior, which consist of: reception mechanisms (sensory receptors in sense organs), transmission mechanisms (the nervous system), and response mechanisms (muscles of both types: skeletal and smooth, and glands of various types). Heredity: where we review the genetic determinant and the gene as main pillars for shaping behavior. Maturation: which explains how the gradual growth of the nervous system imposes constraints on behavior in the developmental stages that humans or other types of organisms go through.
• Third: The third unit of this book includes: The definition of educational objectives, their levels and dimensions, the problems facing teachers in defining educational objectives, the role of educational objectives in the teaching-learning process, criteria for formulating educational objectives, steps for writing an educational objective, its sources of derivation and classification, then viewpoints on the use of educational objectives in the teaching process, and suggestions for teaching using educational objectives.
• Fourth: The human personality has multiple aspects. The following aspects can be distinguished among them: Individual differences: which refer to identifying the trait we want to study, whether psychological, physical, or otherwise. The individual's mental abilities: and the theories explaining them, how to measure intelligence, and the tests that can be used for that. Inclinations: which refer to the individual's attempts to seek and participate in specific activities. Attitudes: which are related to the individual's tendencies to favor or reject certain groups of individuals, ideas, or social institutions. Values: which refer to the ideas that determine what is good and acceptable and what is bad and rejected, agreed upon by the majority of society members who hold them in deep respect and are keen to preserve and pass them down through successive generations.
• Fifth: As you see, learning is a fundamental process that occurs continuously in our lives as a result of our interaction with the external environment and our acquisition of new behavioral methods that help us increase our adaptation to the environment. Therefore, the fifth unit includes: The definition of motivation: and related concepts, and the relationship between motives and habits. The effect of motivation on learning: the function of motivation and its uses in classroom learning. Characteristics of motives, their strength, and their effect on individuals, and complex motives. Classification of motives: physiological and psychological. Theories explaining motivation: drive, incentive, affective arousal, cognitive, and humanistic theories. Functions and dimensions of motives: measurement of motivation and its tools.
• Sixth: The sixth unit includes a set of cognitive mental processes in learning that collectively form a cognitive organization in learning: Sensation: which was presented in the second unit of this book as being responsible for receiving information in the individual. Attention: in terms of its definition, nature, types, and influencing factors. Perception: its definition, constancy, laws of perceptual organization, and a number of visual perceptual illusions. Thinking: its meaning, significance, importance, elements, and tools. Types of symbols used by humans in their thinking, characteristics of the thinking process, and its mental operations, types of human thinking, teaching thinking skills, how to solve problems, and creative thinking. Memory: its definition, relationship to learning, stages, and steps. Mental processes in memory, methods of its measurement, types of memory, and influencing factors. Forgetting: its meaning, influencing factors, and theories.
• Seventh: Due to the great importance and comprehensiveness of learning that extends to most situations and patterns of behavior, scientists have made great efforts in their attempts to explain the learning process in humans. Famous among these scientists are: Thorndike, Pavlov, Guthrie, Skinner, Hull, Köhler, Lewin, Tolman, Bandura, and many other scientists who researched in the field of learning. They studied it in its simplest forms based on the belief that the principles of learning often apply to all learning situations. Many efforts have been made to discover the principles and laws of learning, resulting in a number of theoretical frameworks that have tried to explain learning. Most of these theoretical frameworks complement each other because some learning processes that are not explained by one theory are attempted to be explained by another. The theories of learning can be categorized into three main models for explaining the learning process: Associative learning models: This includes classical conditioning theories (Pavlov and Watson) and instrumental conditioning theories (Thorndike, Guthrie, Skinner, and Hull). Field learning models: This includes the theories of Gestalt, Lewin, and Tolman. Social learning models: This includes the theories of Dollard and Miller, and Bandura on social learning.
• Eighth: An individual's concepts play a major role in how they perceive and organize the things around them. They are like laws that determine the manner of perception and organization, becoming part of their experience. The acquisition of concepts during the educational process is essential. Every student must acquire several concepts and mental images of what is happening around them in life for the educational process to be meaningful. Researchers have pointed to a number of educational models that have emerged to help students learn concepts, represented in five groups of educational models as follows: Information processing-based educational models: These models are specifically designed to influence the processing of information and data. The school is primarily concerned with transmitting information, and since information is an important means to achieve educational goals, each information processing-based educational model has its own distinct view on how people think and how their ways of dealing with information can be influenced. Some of these models focus on narrow aspects of information processing such as rote memorization or induction. Individual educational models: These models are concerned with developing individual and group abilities and are based on good planning of education in a way that facilitates the learner's self-learning and paving their own way. Behavioral educational models: These models base their methods and content on behavioral theories in teaching and learning. Social interaction-oriented educational models: These represent two subgroups that emerged due to different viewpoints on social orientation. The general educational model: This talks about Gagné's view on education, identifying a number of basic variables for education, believing that paying attention to them during the education process can achieve good and effective learning.
• Ninth: The topic of self-learning has captured the interest of many educators in our present era, given the increasing attention from researchers and theorists to individual differences among learners, believing that the learner is a unique and distinct individual and that learning is an individual process. As a result of this new trend, modern teaching methods have emerged that have shifted the educational process from the subject matter and reliance on the teacher to a learning process that focuses on the learner, who is considered the center of organized activities aimed at achieving the goals of the teaching-learning process. In this case, learning is more understandable and more resistant to forgetting, in addition to helping the learner with self-learning and enabling them to acquire thinking strategies and organize various methods of their own to achieve the desired educational goals. Accordingly, the unit included both: Self-learning: in terms of its concept, characteristics, principles, justifications, skills, strategies, and practices. Educational kits: in terms of their definition, characteristics, role in activating the learning process, benefits, and components.
• Tenth: The teacher is a fundamental and important element in the teaching-learning process. The cognitive and emotional characteristics that distinguish them play a prominent role in the effectiveness of this process, as they constitute one of the important educational inputs that affect, in one way or another, the achievement outcome at all different levels: cognitive, psychological, performance, and emotional. A successful teacher is one who can perform their role with all effectiveness and competence. The tenth unit includes: Teacher's characteristics and skills in dealing with students: This item included the concept of classroom management, criteria for effective learning, characteristics of a classroom teacher, competencies of a successful teacher, the teacher and careful observation in the classroom. The teacher and classroom communication skills, human relations, verbal interaction, use of questions, and social interaction. Teacher's roles, responsibilities, and tasks: in terms of: the teacher and the comprehensive development of the learner, the teacher's role in organizing the learning process, and the factors affecting teachers' performance of the learning process.
• Eleventh: There is often debate among educators about the content of the school curriculum. Some believe that a number of subjects such as literature and history are worthy of study, while others see them as unimportant in the student's life and therefore not worthy of attention. A third party points out that school curricula should support the study of problems that adults may face in the future. Herein lies the problem of studying the transfer of learning. Learning, as you know, is a continuous cumulative process in which new learning is affected by previous learning. One does not develop their new experiences from scratch but develops them in light of the knowledge and experience they actually possess from their previous learning. Therefore, this unit included: The concept of transfer of learning, its forms, methods of measuring transfer of learning, and its dimensions. Factors that help in the transfer of learning, how transfer occurs, and the theories explaining it.
• Twelfth: Evaluation is a necessary and essential process for any work or effort as a result of the variation or heterogeneity of individuals in all areas that affect their adaptation to themselves and the environment. The process of evaluating learning is necessary for all individuals and must be continuous and comprehensive to perform its function to the fullest in achieving the desired educational goals. Therefore, this unit answers the following main questions: What is evaluation? What are its characteristics, objectives, steps, and tools? How do you build a good achievement test and what are the specifications of a good achievement test?

Book Details:

• Number of Pages: 560
• Year of Publication: 2006
• Binding Type: Hardcover
• Edition Number: 2
• Printing Color: Black
• Size (cm): 17x24
• Weight (kg): 1.100
• Barcode: 9789957061210