Week 3: LT1

Question: Give an example how you would incorporate two of the three cognitive learning theories into a classroom lesson.

Answer:
I would have pre-teaching to determine background information and schemas of the students and group them in heterogenous groups to encourage social learning through building on the conceptual frameworks of each child (constructivist, developmental and social).

This question asks me to provide an example which is a good way to test Comprehension.

Question: Can you apply social learning theory to an activity which you could teach?

Answer:
An activity for reading / phonemic awareness could be given in which students are asked to segment and blend phonemes in the group by each representing a phoneme and then the students are asked to manipulate those sounds to create new words.

This is a good Application question as it is taking theory to practice.

Question: Consider the following situation: A teacher asks her students the same question at the beginning of every class about what they learned the day before. She is always met with silence and therefore provides a summary of what was taught in the previous class. Can you explain in terms of BLT why the students in this classroom do not respond to the teacher when she asks a question at the beginning of every class?

Answer:
The students are encountering the stimilus (the question) and provide no response. The reinforcement of this behavior over time (the teacher providing the answer each time) is the explanation for why the students do not respond - they have been conditioned to expect the teacher to provide the summary and are being both positively reinforced (given the summary) and negatively reinforced (the aversive stimulus of having to speak in front of the class is taken away).

This question is a good example of Analysis, as it asks me to break down the situation and determine why there is a specific outcome.