Understanding Learning: The How, the Why, the What

by Ruby K. Payne

Dr. Payne has written Understanding the How, the Why, the What to complement her workbook Learning Structures, which includes numerous strategies to help students learn vital content while building cognitive abilities. Understanding Learning provides key background in information about how and why these strategies work, along with a synopsis of brain research and cognitive studies.

Genres: Education, Professional Development

Paperback

First published November 22, 2001

About the author

Ruby K. Payne is an American educator and author best known for her book A Framework for Understanding Poverty and her work on the culture of poverty and its relation to education. Payne received an undergraduate degree from Goshen College in 1972. She holds a Ph.D. in educational leadership and policy studies from Loyola University in Illinois, and is the founder of aha! Process, Inc., a company that informs schools, companies and other organizations about poverty.

Reviews

[Sara]

It's more like an informational pamphlet than a book... wish Ruby would have elaborated more on pretty much everything. It's basically a Cliff's note version of a non-existent, excellent educational resource.

[Alaase Mahalah]

In Understanding Learning Ruby Payne breaks down why learning is so much more than being told information. For those of us who seek to take a stand as the primary educators of our children we must have an understanding of how learning occurs. This book offers a framework towards that understanding. #understandinglearning #rubypayne #AlaaseX #momlife #educationstartsathome #education #selfeducate #goalswithingoals

[Brent Newhall]

A brief but very useful book that sharply differentiates between teaching (an external process that may or may not reach a student) and learning (the internal process that education seeks to accomplish). The author provides a number of key insights in how a student is more likely to learn.

[Janet Ott]

If you've read the other reviews, I agree with Sara, it's more a pamphlet than a book, or the precis of a really good, but as yet non-existent tome. It reads like the detailed contents of a Victorian novel more than a book. There's good ideas, but not near enough detail to explain the how-to do it. I guess it's supposed to be a teaser so we'll hire her group to come teach us how to to teach. Basically, she talks about the how, what and why of learning, and that students need help with both abstract representational systems and abstract processes (the how) and making Mental Models (the Why) to understand the content (the what).

[Amanda]

Short easy read.

[Barbara Atlas]

Ruby Payne is less revered in FCPS than whe was in Prince William, but I think it's time for me to reread this.

I reread it and found it far less useful than I remembered.

[Elyse]

Plz read comment re Dr. Payne's book, "A Framework for Understanding Poverty."

[Julie Euber]

NPFY