Peer Review

Educational Learning Theories

Material Detail page

Bookmark

Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:: This open textbook was the result of a remix of pre-existing open materials collected and reviewed by Molly Zhou and David Brown. Learning theories covered include the theories of Piaget, Bandura, Vygotsky, Kohlberg, Dewey, Bronfenbrenner, Eriksen, Gardner, Bloom, and Maslow.
Type of Material:: Open (Access) Textbook
Recommended Uses:: This material can be used as a textbook or as reference material in a educational psychology class or an introductory human development class.
Technical Requirements:: Download full text from this site as CGI
Identify Major Learning Goals:: The goal of this resource is to provide an Open Educational Resource for students interested in the more well know theorists of child development and education.
Target Student Population:: This book is designed as a textbook or as reference material for teachers and students. It would be appropriate for college and university classes as well as for teaching professionals.
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: The resource requires only basic computer skills to download the text.

Rating:
Strengths:: The book does cover the modern educational theorists. Each chapter gives a short biography of the theorist, a synopsis of the major points of the theory (with illustrations if appropriate),classroom importance, criticisms of the theory, references, and creditable references on the Internet. Content quality is excellent for a survey class.
Concerns:: None.

Rating:
Strengths:: The book provides an excellent introduction for students into the theories and theorists governing educational psychology and human development. The book is at an introductory level and is easy to follow. It would be appropriate for a teacher to assign the content in a course when addressing theorists. A variety of educational activities and discussions could easily emerge from the material.
Especially important for teachers is the section, "Classroom Importance," which addresses how the theories can be implemented in the classroom.
Concerns:: The online references may become outdated, but the content is valid.

Rating:
Strengths:: Well structured material. The text is easy to download. The content is well ordered and has the same structure for every theorist. Students could read about multiple or just one theorist, depending on the assignment.
Concerns:: None.

Other Issues and Comments:: The material should be used as background reading and be followed by classroom discussion. It is a wonderful idea to have all the major theorists succinctly in one Open Access book.
Creative Commons: