Transfer of Learning: Cognition and Instruction

Educators and educational psychologists recognize transfer of learning as perhaps the most significant issue in all fields of instruction. Transfer of learning cuts across all educational domains, curricula, and methods. Despite its importance, research and experience clearly show that significant transfer of learning in either the classroom or in everyday life seldom occurs. Simply put, transfer of learning is illustrated by the phrases "It reminds me of..." or "It's like..." or "It's the same as...". This book addresses the fundamental problem of how past or current learning is applied and adapted to similar and/or new situations. Based on a review of the applied educational and cognitive research, as well as on the author's teaching experience with transfer of learning, this book presents a new framework for understanding and achieving transfer of learning.

Current education and educational psychology textbooks either lack or lament the lack of research and guidance to educators on promoting transfer of learning. Thus this book is a necessary basis for all instruction and learning. Based on history and research, the book shows that transfer of learning is not just a technique of learning or instruction, but a way of thinking and knowing.

The only nonedited educational book about transfer of learningWritten in a plain, easy-to-understand styleIllustrates how transfer of learning can be promoted in the classroom as well as in everyday lifePrescribes 11 principles for achieving transfer of learningDemonstrates how we reason using transfer of learning

I. What Transfer of Learning Is The State of Education and the Double Transfer of Learning Paradox Transfer of Learning: What it is and Why it's Important To Teach or not to Teach for Transfer: That is the Question Transfer and Everyday Reasoning: Personal Development, Cultural Diversity, and Decision Making A Brief History of Transfer and Transfer as History

II. What Makes Transfer of Learning Work Knowledge Base and Transfer: of the Usefulness of Useless Knowledge The Spirit of Transfer and Peronsality: Motivation, Meaning, and Emotion Cultures and Contexts of Transfer: Social Origins and Support Systems When Theory Fails: The Importance of a Learner's Theoretical Knowledge for Transfer The Two Faces of Practice: Transfer and that Old-Time Lesson Drill The Similarity-Based Brain: Evolutionary and Neurological Bases of Transfer The Harmonic Structure of Mind: Higher Level Everyday Transfer Thinking Coda: Deep-Context Teaching for Transfer