Book Review
“Creating Learning Centered Classrooms: What Does Learning Theory Have to Say?” by Frances K. Stage, Patricia A. Muller, Jillian Kinzie and Ada Simmons

Review by James H. Schultz, Central Michigan University

Not another book on how to be a better college teacher!  Actually, Stage, Muller, Kinzie and Simmons have produced an ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report—rather than a book.  Also, its focus is on classroom learning theories – not teaching techniques.  At just under 150 pages, the report asks college faculty and administrators to examine learning in college classrooms from the students’ point of view.

The report begins with an examination of why students fail on the college level.  There is a short review relating social processes to college students’ success.  The authors contend that we can no longer presume that every student learns the same way or that widely accepted teaching practices necessarily result in optimal levels of learning.

The body of the monograph covers specific theories of learning frameworks in detail. These specific theories of learning include: attribution, self-efficacy, social constructivism, conscientization, Kolb’s learning styles and Gardner’s multiple intelligences.  Each of these specific learning theories is defined and examined in a model classroom situation.  As an example, the attribution learning theory section uses case studies to examine students who fail in college classrooms.  One student fails due to a perceived lack of aptitude, while another student fails due to a perceived lack of effort. Both cases studies are examined in detail.  The authors infer that, most often, students who fail in class due to insufficient effort do not believe that future failures are inevitable. Meanwhile, students who fail from a perceived lack of aptitude will often engage in procrastination or other self-handicapping strategies that can lead to failure with honor. Each of the specific theories of learning is examined as they apply to gender and racial minorities.  For example, the authors feel that there are often more attribution tendencies in women than men.  That is, women place more weight on lack of ability as a cause of failure, than on high ability as a cause of success.
 
I found the report’s essay style to be very readable—although the flow was often interrupted by multiple footnote references within a paragraph.  The essay style also made it somewhat difficult to reference specific topics for comparison.  However, that was more than compensated for by an excellent “executive summary” and the “Implications for the College Classroom” conclusion.  These two summaries plus an exceptional index and bibliography allowed the reader to locate specific points within each learning theory for definition and/or comparison with minimum effort.

The authors make the reader realize that students don’t just morph into the college atmosphere and succeed simply because they have been accepted to an institution of higher learning.  Rather, this report shows that what students believe about their personal competence for academic tasks and how they interpret their academic successes and failures affects their actual learning.  The authors state, “It is hoped that faculty and administrators will think more broadly about learning from student’s point of view.  And if these theories prompt questioning and curiosity about learning in all its puzzling aspects, this volume will have been a success.”  It was a success for this reader.

Title:  Creating Learning Centered Classrooms:  What Does Learning Theory Have to Say?
Authors:  Frances K. Stage, Patricia A. Muller, Jillian Kinzie, and Ada Simmons
Price:  $ 29.00 (Paperback)
Publisher:  Jossey-Bass
Year:  1998
Pages:  156

ISBN:  1878380842