Some days, I don’t take my Ipod with me on walks. The Pimsleur material I’m using to learn Czech is designed to foster recall. However, keeping at it is an act of the will; it’s dreadfully boring.
The audiolingual method, which the Pimsleur method uses, is based on behaviorism, a nineteenth and early twentieth century concept of learning which examines how the actions of living things are shaped by forces within their environment. Behaviorism eschews the exploration of thought, focusing instead on stimuli and measurable response. Much early work in behaviorism concerned animal learning and utilized rats. While there may be similarities in the learning of people and rodents, the analogies aren’t perfect. Rats don’t have language.
Behaviorism has had a profound effect on American education. The current emphasis on phonics in reading education and on performance testing overall is fundamentally a resurgence of behaviorism.
That is really funny, in a too-close to the truth way.
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