Edward L Thorndike saw learners as empty and passive organisms that randomly responded to external events. Thorndike proposed an S-R theory called connectionism, which held that learning results from forming connections between a stimulus (S) and a response (R), which are manifest through behavior (Schunk, 2004). Thorndike proposed three laws governing learning, the Law of Effect, the Law of Readiness, and the Law of Exercise (Merriam, Caffarella, & Baumgartner, 2007; Knowles, Holton III, & Swanson, 2005; Schunk, 2004), as follows:

• The Law of Effect states that S-R learning is strengthened by satisfactory results and weakened by unsatisfactory results. Rewarded behavior is learned and becomes a habit, while punished behavior is not learned.
• The Law of Readiness states that learning is enhanced when the organism is ready for the connection and inhibited when the organism is not ready. For example, a child who is developmentally ready to learn a task may find a reward in learning the task, but the child who is not ready will find that attempting to learn the task is a punishing waste of time.
• The Law of Exercise holds that repeating meaningful connections strengthens learning while discontinuing connections weaken learning. For example, the more frequently Susan practices a dance the better she learns the dance. Likewise, Susan will start to forget the dance when she stops practicing; the longer she goes without dancing the more she will forget.

Thorndike and other theorists would revise connectionism. Pavlov added to Thorndike’s basic S-R notion the concepts of reinforcement, conditioned, stimulus, and extinction. Guthrie would argue that contiguity is the only law necessary for understanding learning. Skinner would introduce operant conditioning to show how learning is a consequence of behavior (Merriam, Caffarella, & Baumgartner, 2007). Research ultimately did not support Thorndike’s laws (Schunk, 2004), but connectionism laid the foundation for behaviorism. Classroom applications of Thorndike’s theory focused on two key areas: (a) forming good habits in learners, and (b) introducing skills only when the learner is ready, is conscious of the need for the skill, and when prior and subsequent learning reinforces the skill (Thorndike & Gates, 1929).

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