Graduate Education Assitance

Between the ages of 7-11 the child enters the Concrete Operational Stage. During this stage the child begins to really think for themselves and can work out problems in their mind. The child uses more logic and can start to think about how other people would respond and act in certain situations. Lastly the child enters the formal operational stage, which they will remain throughout adulthood. This is the stage where the majority of secondary students are located. As the brain develops into this stage the child can think abstractly and more like an average adult.

A good example is the use of sarcasm in education. I know teachers who never use sarcasm, and others who use it frequently. I would argue that a high school teacher would have a better chance using sarcasm effectively because their students can understand the true meaning of their words. To attempt to use sarcasm with an early elementary student would likely be disastrous as the child would likely have trouble grasping the meaning.

3. Crystal wrote: Jean Piaget’s developmental theory comprised of four cognitive stages of development with individual achievements to be completed before progressing to the next stage. The stages are the sensorimotor stage, the preoperational stage, the concrete operational stage, and the formal operational stage. (Dolgin, 2018). As a child develops through each applicable stage they do so through instruction at home and in the classroom. Classroom learning would be affected through Piaget’s theory by identifying which stage a student is in developmentally and providing instruction accordingly based on the corresponding age group. This would affect classroom instruction based on each stage a student is in developmentally and by age. Adolescents are generally capable of more complex thought than elementary students though not completely able to think abstractly until later adolescence and adulthood. Teachers can identify which developmental skills are mastered by their students based off their previous year’s milestones that were achieved and observation in the classroom. A criticism to this would be not all students are regimented by their age and could be more or less developed than other students their own age. Adolescents become more independent as they progress developmentally and, according to Piaget, would be in the concrete and formal operational stages during middle school and high school. Through interactions students should be able to think more logically and develop reasoning skills while forming a deeper understanding of the world. This I would say is a strength because through general observation of the youth of today and own personal experiences this concept holds true of the adolescent population. I do not agree with Jean Piaget's cognitive development theory as I feel it is too constricting placing each child in a mold they may not fit into. I feel more strongly with the theories of Albert Bandura. His social learning theory focused on how external factors shape an individual’s behavior. Bandura’s theory focused on a term known as “modeling” that referred to adolescents imitating the behaviors and actions of those around them such as parents, siblings, peers, friends, etc. (Dolgin, 2018) Based on my observations, I would agree that especially in this day and age adolescents are more often modeling those around them and have more resources to do so with the influence of social media. By incorporating more technological resources in the classroom, teachers are more likely to motivate students to engage in the material. Therefore, by offering these tools to students more of them will follow suit by seeing their peers actively participating in the instruction.