MEANING AND DEFINITION OF THE TERM LEARNING
Learning situations are the most natural and common in life and everyone of us is learning one thing or the other although he may not necessarily be aware of it. An individual starts learning immediately after his birth. While approaching a burning matchstick, the child is burnt and he withdraws. Next time, when he faces a burning matchstick, he takes no time to withdraw himself away
Thus the behavior of an individual is changed through direct or indirect experiences. this change in behavior brought about by experience is commonly known as learning however, this is a very simple explanation of the term learning. But a complete understanding of the term needs more clarification and exact definition. Some well-known definitions term learning arre as follows:
GARDNER MURPHY (1968: 205): "The term learning covers every modification in behavior to meet environmental requirements"
HENRY P. SMITH (1962: 260): "Learning is the acquisition of new behavior or the strengthening or weakening of old behavior as the result of experience"
WOODWORTH (1945: 288): "Any activity can be called learning so far as it develops the individual (in any respect-good or bad) and makes him alter behavior and experiences different from what would otherwise have been"
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KINGSLEY AND GARRY (2975: 12): "Learning is process by which behavior (in the broader sense) is organized or changed through practice or training)
PRESSEY, ROBINSON and HORROCKS (1967: 232): " Learning is an episode in which a motivated individual attempts to adapt his behavior as to succed in a situation which he perceives as requiring action to attain a goal."
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TEACHING AND LEARNING
For having insight into the concept of teaching, it is important to know the concept of the closely related term learning and also to think about its relationship with teaching.
Learning may be properly defined as a relatively permanent change in behavior (excluding the influence of growth, maturity or lesion). Teaching task or process is also related to realize the same object as may be clear from the definition of teaching given by Clarke (1970) i.e. " activities that ae designed and performed to produce change in student behavior"
It lead us to conclude that teaching consist of all those activities or system of actions that are intended to produce learning.
the question arises whether it is essential for all types of teaching to be ended in some kind of learning. Similarly, it is essential for the learning to be initiated or handled by some type of teaching. Honestly speaking, such type of cause and effect relationship does not exist between teaching and learning. It is not essential for a teaching to be ended with some kind of learning. Similarly, learning may also take place without involving the formalities of a teaching process
Teaching and learning are both regarded to to carry on an intimate relationship on account of their serving the same goal i.e. bringing the desired modification in the behavior of the learner. However, they cannot be taken as synonymous to each similar way, it is not essential for a teaching to come up with some learning and, in the similar way, it is not essential to a learning to be associated with some kind of both are meant for serving the same purpose, i.e. bringing desired modification in the behavior of the learner, then it seems quite wise to make both as the equal partners in the process of teaching-learning instead of allowing them to struggle alone for realizing their objectives in their own independent ways.
