Development of 4th and 5th Grade Learners Across Contexts ED. T&L 694
Development of 4th and 5th Grade Learners Across ContextsED. T&L (on-line)Summer 2009 Final Project Caleb Arthur Outline Educational Theorists Physical Development
Ideas to Use in the Classroom Top 10 Things Teachers Need To Know The Behaviorist Theory The Interactionist Theory The Nativist Theory Physical, Cognitive, and Language Development Conclusion Educational Theorists
- Albert Bandura - Urie Bronfenbrenner - Erik Erikson - Jean Piaget - B.F. Skinner - Lev Vygotsky Albert Bandura A part of Banduras social learningtheory he makes aware the fact thatstudents will start to become moreselective in what they imitate. Forexample, a student idolizes LeBronJames, therefore they will try to imitatehim (wearing a headband duringbasketball games, wearing baggy shorts,etc.). This can also take place on asmaller scale (looking up to a person acouple grades above and trying to dresslike him or her). Bandura also discusses personalstandards that children set forthemselves. If a child looks at him or herself with negativity, the child will developlow self esteem and low self-belief. As ateacher I should be positive and givepositive remarks to my students so thatthey achieve a high self esteem forthemselves. Urie Brofenbrenner Students will become who they will be the restof their lives based on the microsystem thatthey grow up in. They will develop what mattersto them and what doesnt matter. Theirsurroundings will shape their attitudes towardspeople and other things in life. I should havepositive influences towards my students so thatthey develop good habits in life. I will beresponsible for their learning for one schoolyear so I affect the student in that way also. The mesosystem includes the community thestudent is involved in. The community includesthe parents, peers, neighbors, and child-carecenters that the student (child) is involved in. Asa teacher, I will need to understand where thestudent is coming from and how I can helpdevelop the child. I also must be willing to workwith the mesosystem of the student (parents,community, etc.) Erik Erikson Industry versus inferiority is when children (at school) develop the capacity towork with others. The period of development takes place from age 6 to11. The children also learn how to cooperate. I am going to be certified toteach students from Kindergarten through 5th grade. The ages normally rangein these grades from 5-11, so I will be dealing with the industry and inferioritypsychological stage of children. I should make sure I am aware of studentsstruggling with the inferior stage of development. Inferiority develops whennegative experiences at home, at school, or with peers lead to feelings ofincompetence and uncertainty. Through performing my senior block at LimaHeritage Elementary School in Lima, Ohio I developed a passion for inner citychildren. I learned that there are more students at risk for negative inferiordevelopments due to the students home lives. I want to build and develop myclassroom so that it is conducive to learning and developing skills that studentscan use later in life with great effectiveness. I want my students to developgood cooperation and teamwork skills while in my classroom. Identity versus identity confusion is when children during their adolescencestages start to wonder who they really are. Children start to choose their ownvalues and interests. I think as a teacher, I should make sure that my studentschoose appropriate values and interests. I know when I was going through thisstage; I wanted to be a pilot. In high school I developed other interests andstarted to be interested in teaching. I think I should encourage students tobecome open-minded and have big goals for their future. I dont want any ofmy students to believe that just because his/her parents work minimum wagejobs doesnt mean they have to go up to become what their parentswere. They should have their own dreams and aspirations to become whateverthey want to become. I think I should place effort towards this psychologicalstage so that my future students develop a good outlook on life and dont feelthey have to accept something just because its the way it has always been. Ishould also make good effort in showing my future students how to make goodchoices and that I (the teacher) will always be there to support them if theyneed anything. Jean Piaget Concrete Operational Children start to becomemore logical in their thinking. This stage affects childrenfrom age seven to 11. Children also become moreorganized and less chaotic (they start to plan thingsout). I saw a big difference between my FEEP andsenior block field experience. I noticed during my FEEPthat the first grade class was unorganized and itseemed impossible for the students to stay on track formore than five minutes. During my senior block, thesecond grade I observed had much more organizationthan the first grade class. As a teacher, I should knowthis now and expect it. I should expect first graders tobe less organized and focused than second graders. Formal Operational As with everyone, people matureat different rates, but the formal operational stageusually affects children of eleven years or older. Duringthis stage, children can begin to examine things withreason and understanding. They are able to think of allpossible outcomes in a mathematic and scientificproblem. When I become a teacher, I should bereminded to encourage the students to think forthemselves and not settle for the simplest of answers. Ithink effort plays a big part in whether or not studentsdevelop good reasoning skills, so as a teacher I will be abig proponent of requiring quality student effort in theclassroom. B.F. Skinner Operant conditioning theory I feelreinforcers are important becausethrough my field experiences I thinkstudents respond in a more positiveway when they receive positivereinforcers and/or positiveencouragement. During senior block Ideveloped a Personal Discipline Planand in it I have many positivereinforcers to help encourage anddevelop my future students. Operant condition theory I agreewith B.F. Skinner on that behaviors canbe decreased usingpunishment. Punishment usually resultsa student losing some kind of privilege(loss of recess, call home, etc.). In givingpunishment the student is learning thathe/she should not do that or morepunishment will follow. Punishment isput into effect to help maintain anorganized classroom. Lev Vygotsky Vygotskys sociocultural theory explains that peopleneed to be concerned with other peoplesbackgrounds and cultures and to not have biasesand pre-conceived notions. As teachers, I think it isimportant that we understand where every one ofour students come from. I think we should becareful in planning our lessons, so that we dontbring up any issues that would or could result in aconflict. Another issue that Vygotsky brings up iscommunication between adults and children. Ibelieve the better we communicate with thestudent, the better the student will learn to developbetter communication skills. Communication skillscan help so many other skills in life. Goodcommunication between adults and children alsohelp children develop complex thought processesand positive adult/children experiences. I will makesure that I will communicate clearly and effectivelyto my future students so that they learn anddevelop the skills necessary for the rest of theirlives. Physical Development I believe an important aspect during the developmental stages of males and females from 8-11 yearsof age is (child) obesity. Statistics show that children have been gaining more weight at a more rapidpace than ever in history. I believe a good way to instruct ways to put a decline to childhoodobesity is to encourage good eating habits and active play. Just as responsible as the child - I believeparents play an enormous role in the development of body weight. We need to stress parents notto take their children to fast food all of the time and to develop good eating habits (fruits,vegetables, dairy, etc.). Also, I need to make aware the role of video games and other forms ofentertainment and how they also play a huge role in childhood obesity. I believe video games haveplayed an enormous role in the childhood obesity problem we are currently facing. In my classroom,I will have posters of the food pyramid and other quality information regarding good nutrition. I willencourage my students by not handing out damaging candy (chocolate, etc.).Males and Females -during the developmental stages from ages 8-11 go through rapid and dramatic changes. Self-esteemcan be gained and lost during this time period. Females - tend to grow at a faster rate. They usuallyhit puberty quicker than males do, which can sometimes lead to insecurity. Females not hittingpuberty also may face self-esteem issues. Males - usually have a high range of heights. One malecould be 6', while another 4'6". Males and Females - weight ranges have increased since 1990. Childobesity is a huge problem the world is facing with currently. Males and Females - youth sports startto take a huge part of most children's lives. Children from 8-11 start to show improvements ingross motor skills (jumping higher, running faster, moving quicker, and better balance). Males andFemales - depending on growth spurts, those who have a large increase in height during this timesometimes may lose some balance qualities - also known as being a klutz. Physical Development Timeline for 8-11 year olds. Current Statistics of Children
Children integrate previously acquired skills into more complex, dynamic systems ofaction. There are sex differences in motor skills. Size and strength contribute toboys' superior athletic performance in adolescence, physical growth cannot fullyaccount for boys' childhood advantage.Throughout this time period both boys andgirls experience rapid growing of hands,arms, feet and legs which may lookdisproportionate. Self-esteem can be gained and lossed during this timeperiod.Females tend to grow at a faster rate. They usually hit puberty quicker thanmales do, which can sometimes lead to insecurity. Females not hitting puberty alsomay face self-esteem issues.In both males and females weight ranges haveincreased since 1990. Child obesity is a huge problem the world is facing withcurrently. Ideas to Use in the Classroom
In a classroom, teachers can use creativethinking to promote physicaldevelopment and health within theirlessons. An example of this is something Ihad a teacher do for her math class.Jasonhad an idea from his own personal schooldays we would play "problem ball". Inthis, the teacher would start by throwing aNERF ball out to the class. The personwho caught the ball was then asked aquestion. If they got it right, their teamgot a point, and then they would have tothrow it to someone on the other team. Ifyou did not catch it, then you lost yourturn, and the other team got aquestion. This was definitely an activitythat promoted physical movement as wellas problem solving in a class you wouldnot typically find that. Ideas to Use in the Classroom
Another activity would be to discussnutrition and the food pyramid. Kidsat this age need more iron andcalcium in their diets and are alsoexposed to too much fast food. Wecould have our future classes write acookbook of healthy, low costrecipes tying in language arts andmath. We could also have adiscussion about being active andcome up with a list of different waysto exercise. We would also discusshow many hours of TV the studentswatch and make a bar graph. Thenmaybe make a class goal to getmore exercise and watch less TV. What Will We Do as Teachers?
We, teachers, need tomake a goal to incorporatethese ideas into our futureclassrooms.If we dontmake an effort to get ourfuture students moreactive and moreknowledgeable to the childobesity problem: it will justkeep getting worse.Weshould keep our studentsphysically active and havethem practice good eatinghabits. Top 10 Things Teachers Need To KnowAbout Promoting Cognitive Development Of4th and 5th Grade Learners 1. Teachers need to implement discovery learning meaning using a wide array ofmaterials to meet varying stages of development. Piagets constructivist approachbelieves that the learning environment must allow for the manipulation of objectsand interactions with other children and adults. 2. Teachers need to allow for peer collaboration. Students should be placed in groupsof varying abilities for cooperative learning. By having more expert studentsassist less expert students both benefit in achievement and self-esteem. Vygotskybelieved relationships between peers and adults are critical to studentsdevelopment. 3. Teachers need to model self-regulation strategies and other strategies forstudents. Sieglers model of strategy choice explains that when children have tomake decisions they use a variety of strategies and pick them based on speed andaccuracy. During math, teachers can have students use various strategies to helpsstudents understand the concepts better. Teachers should also have students sharetheir reasoning for why they used a certain strategy to make sure they understandit. During science, teachers can have students form hypotheses and performexperiments and explain the results and their reasoning for their findings. Teachersshould have students work on their comprehension skills during reading by havingstudents use various comprehension strategies. Top 10 Things Teachers Need To KnowAbout Promoting Cognitive Development Of4th and 5th Grade Learners 4. Teachers need to differentiate their instruction to meet the needs and intelligencesof all their students. Gardner believed that there are eight different types ofintelligences such as linguistic, logico-mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily- kinesthetic, naturalist, interpersonal and intrapersonal therefore, not all studentshave the same strengthens, weakness and needs. Teachers cannot just teachtowards the middle but include in their planning all abilities. 5. Teachers need allow for scaffolding of the students learning. Scaffolding is adjustingsupport during a lesson to fit the students developmental level, breaking tasks intomanageable units, questioning, prompting, suggesting and slowly withdrawingsupport leaving the student responsible. According to Vygotsky, children areactively looking for knowledge and their learning takes place in the zone ofproximal development which is a range of tasks too difficult for students to do ontheir own but can be done with the help of an adult or other skilled peers. Top 10 Things Teachers Need To KnowAbout Promoting Cognitive Development Of4th and 5th Grade Learners 6. Teachers need to practice culturally responsive teaching. Vygotsky believed thatchildren learn through both social interactions and their culture. Every studentcomes from a different culture thus bringing with them various, unique experiencestherefore, teachers need to aware of those differences and plan their lessonsaccordingly. 7. Teachers need to provide opportunities for students to develop their logical andanalytical thinking skills. According to Piaget, 4th and 5th graders are in theconcrete operational stage therefore their thinking is becoming more organizedand logical. 8. Teachers need to provide opportunities for students to develop theirmemory. According to the Information Processing Theorist, children developconceptual structures that help them start to think in more complex and advanceways. Children ages 7-11 years old start to gain a better attention span and betterorganization. The children start to store things in their brain meaning theirmemory is expanding and can hold more than before. Top 10 Things Teachers Need To KnowAbout Promoting Cognitive Development Of4th and 5th Grade Learners 9. Teachers need to be aware of each students zone of proximal development. In addition,teachers need to create appropriate activities and give support that will meet theirstudents current needs as well as plan for their future needs. Vygotsky believed that thezone of proximal development was the gap between the students actual developmentand what the student could potential achieve with academic help. 10. Teachers need to practice holistic teaching by designing lessons that support the wholechild including the cognitive, affective and physical domains. Gardner believed there weremultiple intelligences: linguistic, logico-mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic,naturalist, interpersonal and intrapersonal which includes the affective and physicaldomains. Strensberg triarchic theory also requires holistic teaching because he believedthere were 3 broad, types of intelligences: analytical, creative and practical. Carrollshierarchical model of intelligence which the top has general intelligence then the secondtier has eight abilities such as fluid intelligence, crystallized intelligence, general memoryand learning, broad visual perception, broad auditory perception, broad retrieval ability,broad cognitive speediness and processing speed also requires holistic teaching. Thethird tier has narrow abilities which are behaviors that are shown as result from thesecond tier. Carrolls theory implies that teachers need to teach holistically by makingsure to have a variety of lessons and activities that allows for students to use all thedifferent broad abilities that he mentioned. The Behaviorist, Interactionist, and Nativist Theories The Behaviorist Theory
The Behaviorist Perspective B.F. Skinner said that language is acquired like any other behavior - through operantconditioing. If a child 'babbles' a word such as ball-ball-ball-ba-ll-balla - the parentsoon will hold a ball in front of the child inforcing to the child that the ball is aball.Proponents of this perspective also believe that imitation plays a huge role forchildren learning a language. The imitation by the child is directly from the adult(parent). I think that these ideas are very similar to the Interaction theoristsbecause they both involve the interaction with other (adult to the child and soon). The early stages are important for the child when learning a newlanguage. This perspective, however, doesn't really help languagedevelopment. Instead of learning specific sentences, children learn and develop aworking knowledge of language rules. The interaction between adults and childrenis very important. The Nativist Theory The Nativist Perspective
Noam Chomsky believes that children learnmuch of what they need to know on theirown. By observation they learn how a wordsounds and what that word means. TheNativist Perspective believes that children'sbrains do most of the work when learning anew language. They believe that children havethe ability to readily produce and understandcertain words and sentences. They believe thatall children have a language acquisition device(LAD) - this is an innate system that permitsthem, as soon as they have acquired sufficientvocabulary, to combine words intogrammatically consistant, novel utterances andto understand the meaning of sentences theyhear. The main thing that they believe is thatevery human being is born with the ability andbrain (power) to learn and understand alanguage. This perspective differs from thebehavorist and interactionist because it reallyinvolves no interaction between humans. The Interactionist Theory
The Interactionist Perspective The Interactionist Theory is the newest oneof the three. It seems to be more or less acombination of the two perspectives. Thisperspective takes some ideas from boththeories and at the same time doesn't takesome ideas. Followers of this perspectiveuse both the nativist and behavorists ideasto prove how and why children acquirelanguage. They have an emphasis oninteractions between inner predispositionsand environmental influences. The artificialneural networks develop very quickly duringchildhood so hearing, learning, doing is veryimportant if the child is to learn thelanguage well. There is a small window forthe child to learn a language - it would takelonger for the child to learn the languagewhen those neural networks start to slowdown. Physical, Cognitive and Language Development
How do families, peers, media, and schools influence thephysical, cognitive, and language development of 4th and5th grade learners? How does family effect development.
In the United States, a child comes toschoolat the age ofaround five. Before coming to school, the child obviously liveswith his/herfamily. While living his theirfamily they learnmany things that help develop their character, morals, and self- being. With good guidance from parents, othersiblings,extended family (aunts/uncles/grandpas/grandmas) achild will develop language, skills, and social and moral valuesof their culture. Socialization also plays a big rolewithin thefamily. Parents start to socialize with their children sometimeduring the second year. As children get older, parents socializemore and more because they get aresponse from thechild. As the child gets older,theparents can choose whattype ofdiscipline to use.Will they be harsh (grounding) orwill they try and be the child's'buddy'? Through myexperiences, I believe that parents who are buddies with theirchildren rather than a disciplinerian have more troubles withtheir children the older they get. My parents weredisciplinarians and I believe that has help our relationship andhas helped my character develop to where I am now. I knowsome of my friends and that their parents were of the buddytype. Now, those friends do not want to grow up. One is stillliving with his parents and the other has dropped out ofschool. If parents are not disciplinarians their children will lesslikely quit something (my opinion). How do peers effect development.
Peer sociability begins early in mostcultures. Around age 2, toddlers startusing words to talk about and influence apeer's behavior (p. 598). If a child playswith the same child as a young child, thetwo will both somewhat develop thesame character and ideas. If the two areallowed to get away with stuff (doing stuffwrong - break things, fight, etc.) they willboth develop the sense that it is okay. Ifboth children are not allowed to get awaywith these things they will both developthe sense that it is wrong. During this'play' time children develop good fine andgross motor skills. How does media effect development.
Especially now in the 21century, children have a largeamount of media they can attain. Children can nowwatchthings on TV and the computer with a touch of abutton. They can see what people are doing at everysecond of theday (twitter, facebook). They learnso muchfrom the media (and largely it is bad for them). Stereotypescan be made very easilythrough media.Violence in moviesand on TV can hurt the development of a child. If they areexposed to it at an early age with regard they will develop asense that violence is okay (it is okay to get in afight atschool). They learnthis through media and theyhavenoregard for any consequences. The book states that from 6am to 11 pm over 50 percent of the tv shows havesomeform of violence.By experience,I have noticed thatlanguage hasgottenworse - it seems like no one caresanymore whether or not a child curses or uses God's nameis vein.Most children today, are exposed and see/hear thisevery single day.Media needs to be used in adifferentmanorin order for it to help development of a child. I thinkthe biggest thing for media to be used in a proper way is tohave the parents use the media in ways they want theirchildren to use it. If parents are watching a violent movieand they let their child watch it with them - what is thechild learning? If the child sees the parents using thecomputer in awrongway - what do you think the child willdo? How do schools effect development.
Children learn how to interact with theirpeers at schoolbetter thananywhereelse. Usually, the teacher disciplines a child iftheydo something wrong. If a child gets inafight - there are consequences. At home achild may getin a fight with their sibling andthe parentdoesn't do anything.I thinkchildrendevelop the mostat school becausethey are there nearly 7-8 hours a day. Theylearn how to work together. They learn howto use the computer properly. They learnmany things that homes (some) usuallycannot. Children learn a schedule and how tokeep on it. They learnresponsibility and howto manage their work. They learn how tosocialize withkids their age and adults(teachers).Children need to learn fromanearly age how to do these thingsbecauseby the fourth and fifth grade manystudents will be unable to break the badhabits they formed prior such as:impropercomputer usage, unable to work together, etc. Conclusion I enjoyed Development of 4th and 5th GradeLearners Across Contexts (ED. T&L ).Ithink the assignments that helped me learn themost were the Annenberg Videos.In priorclasses, I had already learned about theeducational theorists, so that was a review.Ienjoyed learned how to use wordpress - althoughif something were to be dropped from thecourse, I would say drop wordpress because itseems like all we had to do was copy and pasteour discussion questions to our wordpress site.Thanks. The End Caleb Arthur