9 GAGNE’S EVENTS

Marta Fondo García

Gagne's most essential ingredients of teaching are:

• Presenting the knowledge or demonstrating the skill• Providing practice with feedback• Providing learner guidance

In this theory five major types of learning levels are identified:

1. Verbal information

2. Intellectual skills

3. Cognitive strategies

4. Motor skills

5. Attitudes 

Gagne also contends that learning tasks for intellectual skills can be organized in a hierarchy according to complexity:

1. Response generation2. Stimulus recognition3. Procedure following4. Use of terminology5. Discriminations6. Concept formation7. Rule application8. Problem solving

 

Principles

Different instruction is required for different learning outcomes.

Events of learning operate on the learner in ways that constitute the conditions of learning.

The specific operations that constitute instructional events are different for each different type of learning outcome.

Learning hierarchies define what intellectual skills are to be learned and a sequence of instruction.

Instructional Event Internal Mental Process

1. Gain attention: Stimulus activates receptors - reception

2. Inform learners of objectives: Creates level of expectation for learning - expectancy

3. Stimulate recall of prior learning: Retrieval and activation of short-term memory - retrieval

4. Present the stimulus (content): Selective perception of content - selective perception

5. Provide "learning guidance": Semantic encoding for storage long-term memory - semantic

encoding

6. Elicit performance (practice): Responds to questions to enhance encoding and verification

- responding

7. Provide feedback: Reinforcement and assessment of correct performance - reinforcement

8. Assess performance: Retrieval and reinforcement of content as final valuation - retrieval

9. Enhance retention and transfer to the job: Retrieval and generalization of learned skill to new situation - generalization

Detailed…  

1.Gaining Attention - reception

Giving background information creates validity.The use of multimedia grabs the audience’s attention.Asking questions in the beginning creates an interactive atmosphere

Example: show a variety of computer generated triangles 

2.Informing the Learner of the Objective - expectancy

Make learners aware of what to expect so that they are aware and prepared to receive information.

Example: pose question: "What is an equilateral triangle?" 

3.Stimulating Recall of Prior Learning - retrieval

When learning something new, accessing prior knowledge is a major factor in the process of acquiring new information.

Example: review definitions of triangles

4.Presenting the Stimulus - selective perception

Present the content. The goal is information acquisition.

Example: give definition of equilateral triangle 

5.Providing Learner Guidance - semantic encoding

Presentation of content is different from instructions on how to learn. Use of different channel

Example: show example of how to create equilateral 

6.Eliciting Performance - responding

Requiring the learner to produce based on what has been taught enables the learner to confirm their learning.

Example: ask students to create 5 different examples

7. Giving Feedback - semantic encoding

Regular feedback enhances learning.

Example: check all examples as correct/incorrect

 8. Assessing Performance - retrieval

Independent practice forces students to use what they learned and apply it. Assessing such gives instructors a means of testing student learning outcomes.

Example: provide scores and remediation

 9. Enhancing Retention and Transfer - generalization

Applying learning in real-life situations is a step towards Mastery Learning.

Example: show pictures of objects and ask students to identify equilateral triangles.