Experiential Learning: Experience as the Source of Learning and Development, Second Edition

3. Structural Foundations of the Learning Process

Our intellectual process consists . . . in a rhythm of direct understanding—technically called apprehension—with indirect mediated understanding technically called comprehension.

—John Dewey, How We Think*

A term may be viewed in two ways, either as a class of objects . . . or as a set of attributes or characteristics which determine the objects. The first phase or aspect is called the denotation or extension of the term, while the second is called the connotation or intension. Thus the extension of the term “philosopher” is “Socrates,” “Plato,” “Thalus” and the like; its intension is “lover of wisdom,” “intelligent” and so on. . . . Why a term is applied to a set of objects is indicated by its ...