jennifer wallace

How do we get children to want to learn? This is a huge question for all educators. How can I trick a student into wanting to learn about something that might take an immense amount of mental effort? This really sat with me as I read this week’s chapter. My own son struggles in school and has often found it boring, meaningless, and altogether hard to remember when tons of facts are involved. As a teacher I regularly think about being in his shoes or my struggling students’ shoes. How can I make them want to learn this material? How can I make them remember this material so that they can master the standard?  From the reading I learned that first, you must have the students engaged so that they will pay attention to the content you are covering. You must also present the proper amount of material for your students. Students should not be bombarded with unnecessary information. Have students focus on what you are really wanting them to learn in digestible bits. How can teachers do th...

  Student behavior makes a huge impact on student learning. It affects our classroom, the outcome of learning for the majority of students, and it also affects the teachers. How can we create a positive learning environment for all students?  I think the majority of students can be appeased with operant conditioning, where students are praised for following rules. Most students love to hear their teachers give them a compliment. However, these are the students who will follow rules and do their best in school the majority of the time. The rest of the students who would not do well, will not be appeased with operant conditioning. They may not care about a compliment or smile from the teacher. What do we do with these students? Reinforcers can help strengthen or increase the desired behavior. What types of reinforcers are best? I have found in my experience that these can change from year to year and even class to class when I have taught multiple classes in a day. One class mig...

Blog Entry #1 Educational Psychology Theory and Practice, Chapter 2: Cognitive Development I do believe that instruction needs to be developmentally appropriate for students. There are so many things that we try to teach our students, however they are not ready for them. So as teachers are we setting ourselves up for failure? Do we push the students higher to think as an adult and leave the others behind? As an educator I really have a hard time with this. I don’t want my students to struggle through standards if they are not developmentally ready for the type material being assigned to them. I want to be able to set all students up for success so that they can reach their full potential.  One thing I agreed tremendously with the side of neo-Piagatians in the reading was that the background of children makes a big impact in their learning and their ability to learn. I have seen this with my own eyes. I have taught in two different school districts. One was more affluent than the ot...