Social Cognitivism Learning Log

What?

In Chapter 10, we talked about social cognitivism and how it is a combination of cognitivism and behaviorism. They believe learning is an internal process that may or may not lead to a behavior change. Just because someone doesn't exhibit the behavior, doesn't mean they didn't learn. Social cognitivism is based almost solely on learning through observation. The visual metaphor for this theory is a camera. It is recording information and than it may or may not play it back.

We talked about self-efficacy, which is the way you feel about yourself and how you can accomplish things; modeling, which is when you are demonstrating what you want your students to be doing; vicarious learning, which is when you are watching a behavior and then you do the same behavior; and self-regulation, which is how we are able to set goals for ourselves and accomplish things that we want to.

The Reciprocal Causation is a process that the social cognitivists believe has to be present or else learning won't occur. All parts of the circle must be there at all times.

So What?

Social cognitivism is one of the theories that makes perfect sense to me. With all of the theories before, I agreed somewhat but it just didn't seem like they answered all of the questions. I think that the reciprocal causation shows that all of these pieces are needed in order to complete the learning cycle. This will be very useful when teaching my own students. If we can understand their motivation and their beliefs, we will be able to create a good classroom environment that will meet those needs. Then we will be able to see the behaviors from the students that exhibit what we are encouraging them to do.

Now What?

The hardest part of this theory will be getting to know each of our students and understanding what their motivating beliefs are. This is vital to the learning process, so it will take some time to really get to know your students in order to be a great teacher. I will have to make time in an extremely busy schedule in order to understand my students. It is going to be difficult, but it is an essential piece to the puzzle.

Chapter 9 Learning Log

What?
This week we studied Behaviorism and how we could use it in the classroom. The definition of learning, according to Behaviorists,is a semi-permanent change in behavior. They focus more on the outward manifestation of learning through the behavior. If you have learned, than you will exhibit the behavior. We talked about the differences between classical conditioning (Pavlov) and operant conditioning (Skinner). Both theories are very unique, but I will probably use more operant conditioning in my own classroom, which is using reinforcers to create behavior. We talked about the different types of reinforcers that could be used in the classroom, such as a token economy, activity reinforcement, self-reinforcement, social reinforcers, etc. Another important topic that we discussed was the misconception of what a "negative reinforcer" is. All reinforcers INCREASE behavior. It doesn't matter whether it is a positive or negative, it still should increase the behavior. A "punishment" is meant to DECREASE behavior. An example of a negative reinforcer is the seat belt noise that dings until you put your seat belt on.

So What?
This is an important topic because we will continually be trying to help get our students motivated in our classroom. It's really interesting to look at all of the different types of reinforcers and see which one is something that I can see working. Because our students have been trained to be "rewarded," we will need to help them see WHY they are doing what they're doing and how it can apply to the real world. I liked the example of the inner-city school token system that Dr. Cox gave us in class because it was applicable to real life and the students could see the link between the two.

Now What?
Now I have to decide what kind of reinforcers I want to use in my own classroom. I think if I'm teaching in a younger grade, such as 7th or 8th, I wouldn't mind using a modified token economy. I think it could be turned into something that would make them motivated to learn but it could also teach them about life in general. I will be sure to be careful about over-reinforcing because I think that can be detrimental to their learning. As long as we keep the students' learning as a priority, reinforcers can be used positively and productively.

Knowledge Construction Learning Log

What?
This week we studied chapter 7 and learned about contructivism. Constructivism believes learning to be an active process in which learners construct their own meaning based on prior knowledge and experience. We compared learning to the root system of a tree. The roots gather the nutrients (or memories/experiences) that they need and then shoot out more and more roots. Because they are building off of older roots, we can see the resemblance between how we learn. Our knowledge continues to grow as we form new schemas based on prior knowledge and experiences.

In the chapter, it also talked about how we need to help students make multiple connections when teaching them new information because it will help them store it in their long term memory. By working in groups to solve problems, social constructivism, they will be able to get a larger view of the world and its perspectives, and they will also be able to gain a better understanding of the content.

So What?
We obviously want our students to remember what we are teaching them, so each of the theories that we are learning will help us along the way. Constructivism focuses on making multiple connections and building off of prior knowledge which is extremely feesible to do in the classroom. We should strive to help our students organize the information that they are learning into the correct schema by giving positive and negative examples of the content. We should also strive to create a community of learners; a class in which the teacher and students actively and collaboratively work to help one another learn.

Now What?
In my field experience for this class, I'm excited to see these theories at work. It will be interesting to see if the cooperating teacher implements activation of the students prior knowledge in order to help them learn the material. It will also be interesting to see whether or not the teacher uses group work to engage the students. Social constructivism is important for students to experience so it would be fascinating to see how teachers use it in the classroom.

Memory Learning Log

What?
This week we studied Chapter 6, "The Learning and Cognitive Processes." We focused a lot of our attention on memory and how we remember things. In the three component model, we can see how memories are processed and how they are eventually stored or lost. (see image below)



I learned a lot of new things about memory that I didn't know before. For instance, I didn't realize that all of our memories are tied to emotions or senses. As I thought back to some of my earliest memories, this theory held true. I remembered mostly traumatic events or things that were tied to a smell or feeling. We also talked about how one's prior knowledge and beliefs play a major role in the meanings and memories that people construct. We used the idea of a filing cabinet as a visual metaphor for how the things that we learn and remember are stored. We also talked about the different ways we can help our students to "encode" or access prior knowledge in order to help them remember the new knowledge. Some ideas are: Rehearsal, Meaningful Learning, Prior Knowledge, Organization, Elaboration, Visual Imagery, Enactment, Mnemonics, and many other strategies.

So What?
This information will come in very handy in teaching. If we expect our students to actually remember what we are teaching them, we need to use different encoding strategeis to help them connect to the material. The more connections we assist our students in making, the more they will remember what we have taught them. It is our responsiblity as teachers to assist in this process and not to assume that our students can do it on their own. We should use different methods in order to help students discover which works best for them as an individual.

Now What?
I would be interested in learning more about how we can help our studnets make more connections with our content. Many students have absolutely no interest in English but if I can help them engage in the content, they will not only enjoy the material but they will also be able to remember it. I'm also curious at what age students can figure out what method helps them recall information. It seems like the concept of actually "remembering" could be a complex one.