Theory of learning is an independent part of the science of pedagogy. It is also commonly called didactics (from the Greek "didacticos" - educating, instructing). Teachers in the schools of ancient Greece were called didascals, since they were entrusted with the responsibility not only to give young people certain knowledge, but also to educate them as real citizens. Gradually, in the colloquial language, this concept acquired a contemptuous meaning: “the desire to teach everyone, to moralize unnecessarily.”
But the German educator W. Rathke returned the lost meaning to this term – the art of education or the scientific theory of learning. In the work of Jan Amos Comenius "Great Didactics" it is indicated that this theory applies not only to children at school, "it teaches everyone everything", and therefore it is universal. Indeed, in the course of our lives we learn something new every day, and how well we learn information depends onways to submit it. Methods, techniques and types of didactics were further developed by such prominent scientists as V. I. Zagvyazinsky, I. Ya. Lerner, I. P. Podlasy and Yu. K. Babanskiy.
Thus, modern learning theory explores the interaction and relationship of "educational" teaching with the cognitive activity of schoolchildren. It sets itself the task of improving the educational process, developing new effective pedagogical technologies. In addition, it describes and explains the process of upbringing and education. For example, didactics at different stages of the learning process calls for the use of various forms and methods of cognitive activity: teacher - students; schoolboy - book; child – class and others.
Thus, the theory of learning says that knowledge is acquired by us not by itself, not in isolation, but in unity with the principles of their presentation and the practice of their application. Moreover, each science has its own specifics of material presentation: physics, chemistry, and other applied disciplines are fundamentally different from the process of teaching music or philosophy. On this basis, didactics distinguishes subject methods. In addition, it is believed that this science performs two main functions: theoretical (gives general concepts to students) and practical (inculcates certain skills in them).
But also one should not discount the most important task of pedagogy - the education of an independent personality. A person must not only acquire theoretical knowledge and apply it as the teacher explained to him, but also be creative inusing these original theories and practices to create something new. This area of pedagogy is called "developing learning theory". Its foundations were put forward back in the 18th century by Pestalozzi, pointing out that in a person from birth there is a striving
nee to development. The task of the teacher is to help these abilities develop to the fullest.
Soviet pedagogy proceeded from the principle that upbringing and receiving information should be ahead of, lead the development of the inclinations and talents of students. Therefore, the domestic theory of learning is based on the following principles: a high level of difficulty for the entire class (calculated for the most gifted children); primacy of theoretical material; fast pace of mastering the material; students' awareness of the learning process. Developmental learning focuses on the student's potential to "spur" them to their full potential.
