Difference Between Transfer And Learning

It is often thought that learning can only take place in traditional settings, such as schools or daycares. However, learning doesn’t have to be limited to an environment or subject. When children develop and learn about themselves and others, it can occur in different types of settings, such as at home, in a playground, or even in unconventional settings such as a bus. Learning is influenced and shaped by the environment a child s around. This type of theory is explored more by cultural theorist, who belief that one’s environment or culture is the main key to their development. It is also believed that the learning done by the child is not limited to school learning, and the material that they have learned in school can be applied to concepts …show more content…
This method of learning new skills is known as transfer. Transfer is “the ability to extract concepts, strategies, and other relevant information from one context and apply them to another (more or less related) context” . There are many type of transfers that one can use to learn about a new situation: a. positive transfer which is when one situation helps with learning in another event to help fill in some of the holes of the new concept; b. negative transfer, which is when one event hinders the learning on how to perform a task in a different situation; c. vertical transfer, which is when you learn a new skill that was built on from a previous skill; d. lateral transfer, which is learning a new skill that might not be related to a previous skill, although the old skill might still be helpful; e. near transfer, which s when the situations are similar to each other; f. far transfer, which is when two situations are different from each other superficially, but deep down, share a commonality; g. specific transfer, which is when there’s overlap between a new and old situation; and finally, h. general transfer, which is when there isn’t an overall overlap between a new and old …show more content…
The first one is the Formal Discipline theory, which relates to general transfer, meaning that it’s believed that using an unrelated situation can help lead to the learning of a new skill. It is believed to happen since it “exercise(s) your mind to learn more quickly and deal with new situations” . The next transfer theory is Edward Thorndike’s Identical Elements theory, which believes that transfer needs to have identical situations that can simulate the same type of response. The last theory is the Situated Learning theory, which claims that transfer is less likely to occur in new contexts especially in ones that are different from the original setting. The skills used or learned may be parallel but it might still be difficult for them to be applied in a new setting or