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I came across this in reading
for my other class...I found reference to BF Skinner's teaching machine and
wondered what it was. It sounds like what he envisioned was what I was thinking
(with Laura's prodding) of doing with the "game" for finding
cavities on an x-ray.
"The teaching machine is
composed of mainly a program, which is a system of combined teaching and
test items that carries the student gradually through the material to be
learned. The "machine" is composed by a fill-in-the-blank method
on either a workbook or in a computer. If the subject is correct, he/she
gets reinforcement and moves on to the next question. If the answer is
incorrect, the subject studies the correct answer to increase the chance of
getting reinforced next time.
The teaching machine is merely a
device for presenting the set of frames of which the program is composed.
However, it is not supplementary but all-inclusive. The program will do all
the teaching through a response/reward mechanism. Skinner also noted that
the learning process should be divided into a large number of very small
steps and reinforcement must be dependent upon the completion of each step.
Skinner suggested that the machine itself should not teach, but bring the
student into contact with the person who composed the material it
presented. He believed this was the best possible arrangement for learning
because it took into account the rate of learning for each individual
student. "
Here's the site I got it from:
http://people.lis.illinois.edu/~chip/projects/timeline/1954teaching_machine.html
Rhonda
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