Another Typical Day (adapted from Educational Psychology Casebook, Willems & Gonzales-DeHass)

Ben is on the playground with his class during recess. He realizes his shoe is untied so he attempts to tie it. After several attempts, he asks Mrs. Sullivan, his teacher, to help him. As she ties his shoe she sings a song about a bunny, which she hopes will help him remember how to tie his shoe. "Ben, are you listening to the song?" asks Mrs. Sullivan. "Yeah, it is like the song that my mommy sings about Funny Bunny!" he replies excitedly. "Well, it is about a bunny, Ben, but this song is a little bit different, the words are to help you remember how to tie your shoe,' Mrs. Sullivan replies gently. "It is just like funny bunny", replies Ben. "Ben, it is not like Funny Bunny, I know that song too because I sing it to my son…" Now he interrupts Mrs. Sullivan and asks in amazement, "You have a son?” "Yes, Ben, I have told the class that many times. His name is Richard and he is thirteen." "Oh, yeah, that. I just thought you were telling me that you are a mommy but you can't be a mommy cause you are my teacher!" Ben says with excitement as he runs happily toward the other children now that his shoe is tied. Mrs. Sullivan grins in amusement; after all, she knows that she will have to continue tying his shoes for a bit longer.

Just then Mrs. Sullivan overhears a conversation some of her students are having. "Betty did not cheat, cheating is when you lie about your pieces and hide them and then use them later!" says Billy. "Yeah, but he ran around the swings and not under them like we were supposed to and that is cheating!" exclaims Sheri. "No, it isn’t because he did not take anything!" Cries Billy. The students then all agree with Billy and continue to play. Since the students resolved this problem themselves, Mrs. Sullivan decides to check on Sydney who normally is always playing in some activity with peers, but who today is sitting by herself. When Mrs. Sullivan questions Sydney, she tells her that she would like to play with the other children, but she accidentally brought "Kitty," her toy cat, to school today and she does not want to leave her all alone. "How about if I take kitty and keep her with me while you play?" replies Mrs. Sullivan. "Yeah! Thanks, Mrs. Sullivan!" replies Sydney excitedly; she then kisses kitty and rushes off to play.

Later that day, Mrs. Sullivan has her teacher’s aide help students with their math lesson. She ability grouped the students. This can be difficult because the kids are changing and learning so quickly it is hard to know what they can and cannot do without assistance. Mrs. Sullivan instructs Sarah, her assistant, that she may help the students with their assignments, answer questions, and provide any guidance that they need. Sarah understands that her assistance does not include giving the students answers or solving the problems for the kids. Mrs. Sullivan wants to determine which problems the students needed assistance and asks for a mark by each problem Sarah provided assistance. Mrs. Sullivan explains to Sarah that the check marks will inform her of what the students can accomplish independently and what they needed assistance with.

Submitting Your Assignment
You will submit this assignment together with assignment 8.2 at the end of this lesson. Prepare both assignments for this lesson (8.1 and 8.2) into a single Word file. At the top of your Word file, add the lesson name, your name, email address, and the date. Below, write "Assignment 8.1". Do not submit this assignment until you have also completed assignment 8.2.

Grading Criteria

According to Piaget, identify the stage of cognitive development the students are likely to be in (2) Judge whether Mrs. Sullivan understands her students’ cognitive development and support your answer with examples (2) Explain how Vygotksy’s concept of scaffolding is demonstrated in this case (2) Discuss an instance in the case that involves the zone of proximal development (2) Relate instances in the case that demonstrate a child’s schema (2)

Points: 10

Assignment 8.2: Draft of Final Project

Now that you have read about many different views towards learning and motivation, it is time to start thinking about your final project that that you will submit in lesson 10. For now, please submit a draft with your ideas about your project. Before submitting your final project in lesson 10, please take a good look at the feedback or suggestions that your course instructor may give you after you turn in this draft. Please answer the following questions about your project:

1. Describe a specific instructional objective that you would like to teach. This can relate to anything in your personal or professional life (e.g. identify the main processes of the water cycle, compare and contrast geometrical shapes, critically evaluate World War II propaganda posters, etc.).
2. Choose and describe your target audience (developmental level, motivation, level of expertise) and learners’ context for this lesson (e.g. K-12 classroom environment, out of school context, distance education workshop, or just in time training).
3. This will be a technology enhanced lesson. Therefore, please describe your delivery medium and in what way you would use any technology to enhance learning. Make sure that you describe how any of these technologies could enhance learning (e.g. in what ways would your learners benefit from using collaboration tools, presentation tools, blogs/wikis, an instructional video, a web-based tutorial, etc.).
4. Please explain which concepts or principles from the readings you would be interested in applying. For your final project, you will choose at least five different guidelines from at least two different chapters of the Educational Psychology book. For example, maybe you may want to reduce the cognitive load of your learners as they learn about many different plants by creating mnemonics with the learners.

Conversely, in order to teach students trouble-shooting skills in new situations, you may decide to develop a more constructivist environment in which you provide students with multiple representations of content and a problem-based learning environment. Do not only explain which concepts you will apply, but also how you plan to apply them. For example, as you describe your problem-based learning environment, explain which steps or strategies you used (e.g. I will first come up with a challenge, students will then come up with ideas, etc.).

Submitting Your Assignment
Under your last assignment (8.1) in your Word file, write "Assignment 8.2" and respond to the items above.When you have completed both assignments of this lesson, make sure you name your final file "Assignment8". After you have saved your file, go to the student interface and submit your assignment for grading. Click here if you need additional information regarding submission of your assignment.

Grading Criteria

Described your instructional objective (2.5) Described your target audience and learners’ context (2.5) Described the role of technology and how it enhanced learning (5) The described concepts and principles align well with the chosen objective, target audience, and learners' context (5)

Points: 15