Philosopher John Dewey believed “the aim of education is to enable individuals to continue their education….The object and reward of learning is continued capacity for growth.”
Learning skills are cognitive skills that are defined in three broad categories:
- Information and communication;
- Thinking and problem solving; and
- Interpersonal and self-directional skills.
Learning skills enable people to acquire new knowledge and skills, connect new information to existing knowledge, analyze, develop habits of learning and work with others to use information among other skills. These “knowing how to learn” skills provide both flexibility and security in an era characterized by constant change. People who can learn new information, new ways of doing things, for example, have opportunities to make larger contributions to the world than who cannot.
