What is Learning? Mind Map

When I initially created my mind map in unit 1, I didn’t give it a whole lot of thought past what I had already decided learning meant for myself. I had always believed the education was important, and learning opened doors for everyone. I also believed that learning was inevitable—you didn’t have to go to school, do well in school, attend college, or anything remotely related to school to learn something. There’s a reason for clichés like “you learn something new every day” and references to being “street smart” that don’t have anything to do with attending school. Everyone learns—some more than others and often in different ways. The term “learning” is very general and can be applied to a myriad of people, situations, etc.

I still believe that, but looking at the mind map I created all those weeks ago (I know it was only six weeks ago, but it feels like much longer), I found myself struggling with what I had written. They were all true, of course, but they didn’t really encapsulate much of what learning was really about. I had thought a lot about learning in my lifetime, particularly during my undergraduate career when I was forced to think about learning in my secondary education classes. But I’m not sure I really ever sat down to think about what learning was until now. And after all these weeks in this course, I think the most important conclusion I have come to is in the bubble at the top of my mind map: learning means changing.

Everything you learn changes you—changes how you think about the world and who you are as a person. Maybe that seems a little out there, but I believe that everything you learn changes you at least a little, even if you don’t notice it. You cannot learn without changing, and that’s the point of learning. You’re supposed to change. You’re supposed to become smarter and more educated. You’re supposed to come up with new, different ideas. Learning a lesson in a non-academic sense means you were taught something that changed your behavior. If you are stagnant, you are not learning. If you are learning, you are changing, bit by bit. I’ve learned this throughout this course, even if I didn’t realize it until today, and that’s what made my views on education changed: learning.