Motivational Factors

Motivation brings inlaid the concept of impulse for action and the maintenance of such action. Schank (1995) states that learning is a natural process that happens in the form of a " waterfall": first, the apprentice creates a goal, then generates a question and, finally, answers the question. This process brings implicitly the importance of motivational factors in learning: when there is a desire to learn to ride a bicycle, for example, a goal was created. During the process of "riding a bicycle", the apprentice will fall, loose balance or feel foolish, and all this will make him question exactly, even if internally, what he is doing wrong - why can't he succeed in riding a bicycle? He will then look for answers to this questioning, and will learn.

However, Schank doesn't expose the initial motivational role: why would someone want to ride a bicycle? Also, following the same reasoning, why didn’t the apprentice give up when he fell for the first time? This motivation "to continue trying" is a consequence of the internal pressures generated by curiosity or challenge, both feelings of inadequacy. So, for the learning to occur entirely, a constant stimulation of the student's motivation is necessary.

To successfully keep the motivation, researchers develop new educational proposals, like self-orientation and personal effectiveness as educational goals (Barrel, 1995). This way, the students can make their own learning decisions, cultivating an existing desire in all human beings: independence (Goodlad, 1984). Another important motivational factor is the relevance of learning. Students learn more effectively when what they are being taught has direct relation with their reality, offering them a chance to become agents of their own lives (Freire, 1996). "When professors add new information to the previous knowledge of the student, they activate his interest and curiosity, and apply their teachings with a sense of intention" (Presseisen, 1995). It is not enough, therefore, to simply adopt the "natural waterfall" proposed by Schank. The teacher needs to show the student that it is good to get your feet wet, "to climb the waterfall".

Sensorial Factors

Senses are open doors to information in the world. All our knowledge comes directly from the mechanisms that we possess to absorb reality and to represent it. As a biological phenomenon, a human being has systems of perception capable of stimulating the brain to interact with the outside world, to understand it or to modify it, as a way to guarantee the adaptation of the species. The quality of this perception varies from person to person, and from culture to culture. "To perceive is to know, through the senses, objects and situations (...) the act of perceiving can also be characterized by the limitation of information. It is perceived according to a perspective. The possibility of apprehending the totality of the object only occurs in the imagination, which constitutes, on the other hand, a form of organization of the conscience internally protected against error".

Under this definition, there are some hidden basic aspects of learning. One of them is the limitation on the amount and the quality of information that can be perceived. This can easily be understood when we study, for example, Classic History. No matter how hard we read about the subject, no book will be able to transmit the feelings, the odors, the colors accurately, the social tensions and politics that existed at the time. Another aspect poses the question of perspective: one perceives what one wishes to perceive. In practical learning, this means that it is of little value to insist on teaching a pupil whose basis of knowledge differs from the professor's, since his perspective of the subject is another - it would be like trying to talk with a Chinese person without knowing how to speak Chinese. In this case, according to the concept of perception by Penna, there is no real perception of the object of study, but an inadequate mental construction that shelters the mind against error. In other words, "no human being (...) can dominate presented elements under a way not manageable by the nervous system" (Greenspan, 1999).