Complete thesis - Murdoch University

expertise – intuitive situational response is automatic in the expert. Fine grained discriminationbetween situations is based on abstract representations formed through reflectionon experience. Decomposition of the situation into discrete elements is not undertaken(nor required). While the situation remains stable, expertise does not require constantlearning.In later writings, Dreyfus (2001) added a sixth stagemastery – sense that there is no one right thing to do and that improving is always possible.Such continually concerned experts are never complacent. By ‘brooding’ over successesand failures, the expert can progress from responding immediately to specific situationsto responding immediately to the whole meaningful context: reaching a new level ofskillful coping beyond expertise and developing a ‘style’.In relation to education, Dreyfus also suggests that the higher modes of functioning – intuitiveexpertise and mastery – require risk taking (and hence emotional engagement), directexperience and active involvement in the company of experts.It is possible to map the depth of knowledge attained during the various phases expressed aslevels in a taxonomy. The most widely applied and understood is that of Bloom et al (1956).Bloom attempted to classify forms of learning into three domains, cognitive, affective andpsychomotor. The taxonomy of learning objectives addressing the cognitive domain representincreasing levels of cognitive complexity, each level encompassing those below:knowledge - remembering and recalling facts, dates, events, places. Learning objectives atthis level include: know common terms, specific facts, methods and procedures, basicconcepts, principlescomprehension - perceiving and understanding what is learnt, interpretation of informationin one’s own words, grasping meaning. Learning objectives at this level include:understand facts and principles, interpret verbal material, charts and graphs, translatematerial from one form to another (eg verbal to visual/mathematical), estimate futureconsequences implied in data, justify methods and proceduresapplication - using knowledge in a specified manner, application of methods, theories, conceptsto new situations. Learning objectives at this level include: solve mathematicalproblems, construct graphs and charts, demonstrate correct usage of a method or procedureanalysis - separating a concept into its elements, and determining their relationships, identificationof patterns, requiring an understanding of both the content and structural form64