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Materials for Class
Useful Links for Class
- No Dentist Left Behind
- Standardized Testing- Simpson's Episode
- Assessing Students through Different Methods
- Spelling Assessments/Games
- Rubric Maker
- Discipline- Simpsons Episode
- CHP 12- Article 2
- CHP 12- Article 1
- Mr. Holland's Opus Movie Clip
- ChP 10- Constructive Classrooms
- CHP 10- Detailed info on constructivism
- CHP 10- Hyptermedia with constructivist approach
- CHP 10- Constrasting direct and constructivist approaches
- CHP 10-High/scope program for teaching
- CHP 9- Master Theater
- CHP 8- Youtube clip
- CHP 8- Memory Forum
- CHP 8- Memory Games
- CHP 8- Memory Games (NEMO)
- CHP 8- Boosting Student Memory
- CHP 7- Article about Difficult Child
- CHP 7- Management Scenarios
- CHP 7- Samples of Reinforcement
- CHP 7- Management Inventory
- FREE MUSIC
- Citation Machine!
- Library - for Research Articles
- APA Style guidelines
- Girls and Computers Video
- Links for Chapter 4
- Web Sites for Chapter 3
- Sample Video from EDPS 530 Student
- Possible topics for Video Presentation
- Article: Standards for Good Teaching
About Me
- Dr. Pratt
- Office Hours: Wednesday 1:00-4:00 TECH 206 (Education Office) Phone: 785-5578 email: dpratt@pnc.edu
By studying Vygotsky's theories I am able to know my students ZPD. This allows me to plan instruction that is challenging for them, but not so challenging that they will shut down. This zone allows me to scaffold instruction by asking questions and/or giving hints to ensure that they come to the right solution without me telling them the answer. It also helps with choosing "just right" books. Students begin to understand that not everyone will always be reading the same book or same kind of book. Students will read from books that are at their personal reading level.
ReplyDeleteBy knowing Vygotsky's theory, I will be able to address a part of Erikson's theory. Erikson's theory states that students from age 6-11, my 5th graders, will be in the industry vs. inferiority stage for most of the school year. I can ensure that I am not encouraging competition between my students. I will ensure that I am just encouraging them to do their personal best and not worry about what other students are doing. I can encourage and assist my students to be successful at their assignments.
Piaget's theory helps me understand how my students are making connections between their prior knowledge, misconcepetions, and new experriences. By knowing this, I can help them create more knowledgable schemes. I can also ensure that my lessons are at their cognitive developmental level. My students should be in the concrete operational stage. I know that students will be able to make connections based on their concrete experiences and will need to provide them with diverse experiences to ensure that their misconceptions are challenged. I will also allow them to work in groups to learn from one another. Lastly, understanding Kohlberg's theory will help me to ensure I am observing students' moral development and encouraging positive character choices. WOW, that was long, but I beleive I addressed all the theories. What a long chapter...
Individualization is the theme between all of these theories. Knowing and using developmental information on each student is important and enhances learning.
ReplyDeleteBy using Piaget's theories, I can ensure that my students have appropriate schemes by asking questions that help smooth them into adaptation. I can also make sure that students are in disequilibrium for an appropriate amount of time (which is most conducive to learning) which can be different for each child.
Also, giving students concrete experiences helps them move from one stage to another. Some students need more finessing than another, but knowing which ones is the process that is often overlooked. Taking the time out of classroom instruction to assess developmental levels is difficult, but very necessary to meaningful teaching.
As adults, it's easy to forget what it's like to learn as children. We have had so much more life experience through which to develop complex schemes, practice abstract thinking, and organize our knowledge that it can be easy to feel teaching is mostly about imparting content knowledge to children. Piaget's theory of cognitive development really serves as a great base for helping educators understand what may or may not be age-appropriate instruction. Most of my fourth graders will be functioning at the concrete operational stage in which they do best generalizing from more concrete experiences. This means that hands-on opportunities to see, explore, and build might best fit their learning styles at this age.
ReplyDeleteVygotsky really makes me think carefully about the types of question and support I provide to my students during guided and independent practice. More than just imparting knowledge, asking effective questions can prompt children to accomplish tasks above their grade or age level ability.
Erikson's theory of psychosocial development reminds of me of the importance of personality development through school experience. My fourth grade students would mostly fall in the industry vs. inferiority stage. Without proper support, children who repeatedly fail to complete basic tasks might develop a stronger sense of inferiority in school that could cause further harm as they develop. On the other hand, promoting individual recognition for hard work and avoiding comparing between students might foster the industry students need to succeed.
Kohlberg's theory of moral development was interesting to me because there seemed to be a gap between children being able to think about making right choices in a more dilemma and how they would actually act if involved in a similar scenario. Character education programs seem very popular currently, which made me wonder what, if any, consistent qualities of these programs make them successful and how role play or modeling may or may not affect students' decisions when presented with moral dilemmas.
All of these theories about human development allow me, as a teacher to better understand what can influence a student's behavior in any given circumstance and how it may change at different ages. This will help improve classroom management while at the same time allow me to develop better lessons to best suit my students' needs and to also keep the lessons within their zone with a good balance of scaffolding to encourage those who may otherwise give up on something too quickly because they believe they will never get it.
ReplyDeleteTaking another look at these theories gives me a little more insight to why certain instructional strategies work better than others. Piaget, for example, believed that kids interacting with other peers develop better cognitively than those interacting with adults. Not that I necessarily agree, but this explains why many educational strategies often suggest teachers provide opportunities for this social interaction . . . like cooperative learning. I also think studying these theories will help improve management in my classroom.
Are you sure this was only one chapter and there wasn't a huge editing error somewhere, like maybe 30 pages in?
Reflecting on Piaget's theories provide insight as to why a student may not have picked up the new math skill that we worked on today, even though many other students found it rather simple. By asking carefully constructed questions, I could better help to guide a student through his/her thought organization.
ReplyDeleteDuring our Advisor/Advisee period, we often have conversations or activities that involve character building. It's encouraging to see that discussions and role playing do have a positive impact even on older students. I think we sometimes look at middle-schoolers and feel like we can't change where they come from.
As I read through this chapter, I found something in each of the theories that I could connect to personally and professionally. I think the best way for me to reflect on what I read is to get to know my students and apply what I learned to their specific needs.
ReplyDeleteWhile I can appreciate and respect the theories of Erikson, I personally felt that it might be more applicable to adolescent and adult development. I felt the greatest connection to Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development. As a first grade teacher, I see my students as living examples of children in the preoperational stage. It gives me a clearer understanding of how and why they learn. It also helps me to recognize students who are struggling to learn. I can also recognize the characteristics of students who are becoming concrete operational learners. They are the students who are identified as GT, but they may really just be developing at a quicker pace than their peers.
I also was impressed with the Vgotsky's theory that social interaction is the primary cause of cognitive development. There is so much evidence of this in my classroom. Students learn by example. The students who come from homes that support education tend to achieve more.
As a 4th grade teacher I teach and observe students with a wide range of developmental levels. I think that is one of the hardest parts of teaching.
ReplyDeleteKohlberg's description of moral development, specifically the six stages of moral reasoning, seemed accurate when comparing his theory to my students. Level 2: conventional morality, describes many of my students' needs to follow rules and impress others (their peers, parents, teacher, principal). For example, they often aske me, "Is this right?"
Piaget's cognitive development theory and its concrete operational stage reminded me that students make generalizations based on past experiences and my students come to me with a wide variety of concrete experiences. It would be impossible to expect every student to react the same way to situations. The process of equilibration was new to me, but I agree that students need the chance to experiment, question, discuss, etc., because of their lack of life experiences.
This will be my second year as a 5th grade teacher and I think that all the theories help me to better understand my students. Their thinking, prior expericenes, and where they are headed after my classroom.
ReplyDeleteReading again about Erikson's stage of industry vs inferority, it reminds me how influential my comments and nature in the classroom can be. Using positive reinforcement with my students will definately allow them the level of industry and individuality that they need.
Something that stuck out to me with Piaget is the role of social development and interaction with peers. At 5th grade, my students are at the point where they want to be adults, but yet still act like children. In my classroom I do take the time for students to interact and teach each other, using jigsaw or other similar activities. Relating to Vygotsky's theory, this social interaction enhances cognitive development. A proven theory that students learn from each other, that can be seen in most classrooms. Also, using scaffolding to guide my students can take our lessons and their learning to a higher level of thinking.
Looking at all the theories, they really give you extra insight as to why certain students act, think, and do tasks certain ways. Remembering that all your students are different learners and at different stages, is a essentail part of being a successful educator.
As an educator, we try as many methods as possible when it comes to effectively teaching our lessons to the students. While we mean well, sometmes our lessons do not always go as planned. In fact, we may put in the time to plan an awesome lesson and later find ourselves puzzled as to why it didnt turn out the way we intended it to. Likewise, we often try to determine the best rewards, consequences, learning environment, etc. for our classrooms, which is what we should do! However, none of the these things can be considered without understanding the cognitive development of children. Chapter 2 provides several theories to assit us educators in challenging the ways in which we think about our students.
ReplyDeleteFor example, Erickson explains his theory of "Industry vs. Inferiority." I found this aspect very interesting because it's amazing to think about the students in our classes who might already have an inferiority complex prior to coming to school. This could stem from family situations, as well as prior school situations. Erikson stated that the children who feel this way will not produce quality work or enjoy completing school-related tasks. This hit home for me because my school corporation is currently working on cluster grouping. The goal is to place students in classrooms in which each type of ability can shine in some area. For example, removing a few of the higher-ability sutdents allows the other students to "rise to the occasion" and become shining stars. I can imagine that these students who are ued to being in classes with these high-achievers have felt inferior at some point in their educational experience. I know that I need to make sure that I praise every child for his individual success rather than always congratulating those who are usually successful to help lessen those feelings. During my first year of teaching, I had a bulletin board in my classroom where I would tack up the oustanding tests that students had taken. I had wanted to honor those kids for a job well done, but I didn't really consider how the other students probably felt. I know now that it was not a beneficial practice. I have definately learned from that experience.
With reards to Vygotsky, I would agree that social interaction is necessary for learning to occur. It is important that students work in cooperative groups. But as we discussed in class, grouping DOES depend on the classroom situation. I had about 5 or 6 boys in my class that impacted the way in which I created my groups. Behavior must be taken into consideration. However, I do feel that scaffolding is a must!! Even working with my high-ability students in guided reading groups, I still saw the need to scaffold in order to lead them in the right direction in terms of critically thinking abou the novels we were reading.
Each theorist mentioned gave me a great deal of insight into becoming a better teacher by gaining knowledge of developmental levels. I probably got the most out of Erikson's theory of the eight stages. The students that I teach most often are in the industry versus inferiority stage. I had very good mentors who always stressed the importance of giving the children responsibilities and making sure that each experienced success. I now see that this was not only wisdom born from experience, but advice that was well-grounded in Erikson's theories. Vygotsky's theory dealing with scaffolding made a lot of sense to me. I see now that children need full support that slowly diminishes as the child can 'stand' on his/her own. This is a method I've seen in many interactions outside of the classroom in my own family, it is nice to see it in print in my professional growth aspirations. Piaget clarified what I know to be best practices. For example, peer conferencing and collaborative learning are more effective for the vast majority of young learners.
ReplyDeleteI love how Kristen S. started her post. That is SO true, and often times, especially feeling pressure "to get it all in", so easily overlooked! It is so important to remember that children learn at different rates, and are in different stages of development. I remember learning about these theories as an undergrad, reading and discussing them again, so many years later, really helps me to re-think some of my teaching. My 5th grade students are in the Industry vs. Inferiority stage, as well as my 9 yr. old daughter. So knowing the developmental levels of kids also helps me as a mom as I help with homework. As a teacher I have recently been allowing more partner and group interaction when doing lessons. After reading about Piaget's thoughts about social interaction, I will try this next school year to better facillitate partner and group work.
ReplyDeleteIndustry vs. Inferiority (Erikson).... it's so true with my early middle school students (6th graders, usually ages 11-13). I see some kids who are so incredibly motivated to do, learn, grasp, etc. Along with that usually comes a compulsion for good grades or a reward. I know in class that came up today as a negative thing, but I really think that rewarding and recognizing good behavior is the right thing to do. I praise the CRAP out of kids that follow directions, get their work in on time, etc. Inferiority on the other hand, is another thing I deal with. These are the kids who are often on the fringe... they seem like outsiders looking in, sometimes. Sadly, at one point in time, they might have been industrious, but something has compelled them to 'give up'. I don't give up on them, and I praise the CRAP out of them too, if I can get them to even complete small tasks. :) What I really hope for though is that I can find a way to get those inferior feeling kids to become industrious. Any suggestions from anyone?
ReplyDelete