Final

What?... Cognitivism is the theory that I think children learn best. It is the particular way of mentally responding to or thinking about information or an event. It is the way that the learner mentally interprets or remembers what they see, hear, and study. Self talk is a major part of this theory, because the learner has to be able to talk themselves through a certain task. I believe that self talk helps the information to encode, thus making it better to store in you memory. This is evident in my own life because I do a lot of self talk, specially when I am doing something for the first time. A good example of that is when I started to learn how to wake board. When I started getting brave enough to go over the wake, I had to hear my husbands mental process of getting over the wake. When I was getting pulled behind the boat, I was able to use that same self talk to get me through that situation. In the classroom, students need to encode information and store it in their memory as schema. The schema makes it possible that there is a continual learning happening in the brain. Even though I scored highest on the cognitive, I was pretty close with the behaviorism too, which I think plays a role in learning as well. If there is a bad attitude towards learning, it is not going to happen.

So What? ... One of the biggest processes I will use in the classroom is self talk. I want the students to hear me verbally express what I am going through in my mind to solve even a simple math problem. I want my students to verbally say out loud the process that they go through to get to a certain mile stone in a problem. The toughest problems I feel in math are the story problems; I want students to self talk themselves through the problem to help them get to the end result. I wish I had a teacher that did that for me in elementary school because I was not good at story problems because I didn't have self talk. I think that once you self talk yourself through a problem, you make the problem your own. Once you are the "owner" of your problem it is easier for you to encode the information and store in your memory. Also, with self talk I think comes self regulation. That is dipping into the behavior part of psychology, however, I do feel that it is important for students to learn self regulation. In the classroom I want students to be engaged in activities and be able to know how to regulate how they will do a certain project. I will facilitate this by giving the students tasks that they will need scaffolding with and help them make a timeline to get the job done. I think that learning self talk and self regulation are one of the best things a student could learn. Not only as a student these skills are essential but also for life. Students will feel success long after the classroom setting is not a constant for them and they are in the workforce.

Now What?... Now, as I am learning how to implement my goals for the classroom with self talk and self regulation, I need to practice them more to become a master of those skills. I first need to be able to recognize good situations where I am able to use self talk efficiently. Second, I need to find different ways to present self talk, because one size does not fit all in education. Third, I need to come up with a measurable way to see if my plan of implementing self talk is effective in the classroom. Finally, I need to constantly reflect on how I am introducing, practicing, and implementing self talk in the classroom and change anything that isn't effective.
I would like to know more about the brain. I wish that we could have a class on how the brain develops not only through elementary years but after as well. I think that it is so interesting that we are such intricate people. I think that our brain is what sets us apart from other animals on our planet. You don't see a tiger that has just eaten it's prey think to it's self "Now, how could I have executed that better?" That is our brain that makes us reflect and be better intricate human beings. I am fascinated by the development of the brain, I wish that we could have talked about the brain more when we looked in different texts that were brought in.
I need to learn more about behavioral psychology, I understand the experiments that we studied, however, I wish I knew more about actually implementing them in the classroom effectively. I want to know what works and what doesn't work. I know that I will find that out on my own as I am in a classroom. I really think that behavior is a major concern and sometimes an issue in the classroom, I wish I was more of an expert.

Chapter 10

What?... Chapter 10 focuses on Social Cognitive Views of Learning. In this chapter, there was a lot of information about modeling. One of the sections of the book that helped me with modeling the most was the steps of how students learn from modeling. Attention, the learner must pay attention to the model in order to be able to learn the skill that is being acquired. Retention, the learner must remember what the model does. Motor reproduction, the learner must be physically capable of reproducing the modeled behavior. Motivation, the learner must be motivated to demonstrate the modeled behavior. This is the section that made the most sense to me as far as learning a certain skill. When I am trying to pronounce a hard word, or learn another language, modeling is the best that works for me.

So What?... So, taking these new found steps and incorporating them in my study as a student and in my planning as a teacher will be important. I think that modeling is one of the best was to scaffold a hard skill or assignment. The students will be able to work better in their zone of proximal development because they will have the modeling. The teacher needs to break down the steps to the student so that they will be able to recognize that there is a model available for help when they are struggling. Also, I think that modeling is effective in the classroom because students will be able to model for other students. In that exchange, both students will be able to learn from the experience. I feel that it will be effective, because students learn well from other students. There are aspects in teaching that I think the teacher needs to teach, however, there are portions that the students can take over and become self regulated, which will help them in their daily lives.

Now What?... Now as I am a student learning of different strategies to help students learn, I will keep modeling in mind. I want to use modeling in the two different examples as I stated before. There are many different ways of learning, and when something is being learned for the first time, I think that for me, modeling is the best way that I would be able to acquire the skill I desire to master. When there is a student that is accelerated in my classroom, I want to try modeling to help them work in their zone of proximal development. I feel that modeling for other students will be able to enhance their knowledge, and social skills as they are in a regular education classroom. I think that the students learning from another student will make them feel like they have a safe community of learning.

Chapter 9

What?...
In chapter 9 we learned about the behaviorists views of learning. I thought that this chapter, even though I have learned these concepts many times had a different view to me. I never looked at it in a teachers mind. Also, being creatures of habit, I think that from this chapter I understand that habit can be helpful and hurtful to learning. It can be helpful to show order and be operant, the response is usually voluntary, the learner can control whether or not they are going to make it. It can be hurtful when it is classical conditioning because the answer is involuntary and in my personal opinion this is the worst type because learning doesn't happen because they don't make the choice to learn. In my classroom, I want to have routine and order, however, I want the students in my classes to learn to make the decision to learn.

So What?...

So now as I am thinking of ways to manage my classroom in learning and behavior I will have these views to help me. I will have order, and have choices to be made by the students so they can start to take charge of their own education. I think that it is important for students to learn that they are willing and able to made decisions. I feel that elementary years are almost like classical conditioning because we are so automatic to respond. I want the students to make the choice to respond. I think that the ability to make choices will help them socially, even if it is a choice of a side dish. Even something as simple as a decision I think is closely related to behavior. Making decisions creates a behavior and I feel that it is important for students to realize that as soon as they are ready for that. I wish that in my own life, I would have learned this sooner before I said or did that certain something.

Now What?...

Now as I go through life, and preparation for a classroom I am going to keep B.F. Skinner in mind about conditioning. I want to be able to condition myself and classroom to be able to make decisions voluntarily. I want my classroom to be a place where students can decided to make answers and decide to not to answer questions. I think that making a safe learning environment will help students find the appropriate behaviors for the situation. I want to continue to make my study of being a teacher based upon the learning environment I am going to have in my classroom. I want to have a place where children feel that they are safe and their comments are safe. I think that learning these experiments again, even though I have prior knowledge of them really opened my eyes to the importance of behavior.