ABSTRACT
The specific goals of the teaching programmes are poorly formulated, and are usually specified in fairly abstract terms such as 'knowledge' or 'understanding' rather than in terms of specific behavioural performance. Educational institutions are provided, of course, to teach, most with children as the learners. If traditional drills are replaced by more 'humane' approaches to education, it has been found that a child may be adequately motivated by 'finding things out' for himself or with others. One could envisage similar techniques being used at levels of education, and one can readily see how the advantages of teaching machines or programmed texts might be exploited when appropriate. The chapter concludes with the reader is directed to a collection of papers by Skinner, entitled The Technology of Teaching. This includes readable discussions of the use of teaching machines and the application of behavioural principles to curriculum development and to general disciplinary problems in schools.
