Deck 12: Seciton 1: Middle Childhood: Cognitive Development

Question 1

Explain what is meant by metacognition. Then describe how 9-year-old Bolgen can use metacognition to help him prepare for a spelling test. Bolgen gets 10 spelling words on Monday and is tested on Friday.

Answer 1

Metacognition is "thinking about thinking," or the ability to evaluate a cognitive task in order to determine how best to accomplish it, including monitoring and adjusting one's performance on the task.
How metacognition will be used for Bolgen's spelling test should include evaluation of the task, a plan to approach the task, and monitoring and adjusting as the task is being done. For example: On Monday, Bolgen gets the list of 10 words and realizes he knows how to spell four of the words. Rather than studying these four words, he spends Tuesday and Wednesday studying the six new words. On Wednesday evening, he quizzes himself on the six words and discovers he now knows how to spell three more. Thursday, Bolgen studies the three words he still did not know how to spell. On Friday morning before the spelling test, he quizzes himself on all 10 words in preparation for the actual exam.

Question 2

A study (Crosnoe et al., 2010) of reading and math achievement of more than a thousand third- and fifth-grade children from 10 U.S. cities found that high-scoring primary school children were likely to have had extensive cognitive stimulation from three main sources. List these three main sources of intellectual activity identified by the study.

Answer 2

The three main sources of intellectual activity were: 1) families-especially parents who read to the child daily, 2) preschool programs that emphasized a wide variety of learning activities, and 3) a first-grade curriculum that had a literary emphasis with individual assessment.

Question 3

In the United States, there are four types of educational environments for children: public schools, charter schools, private schools, and home schooling. Define each of these alternatives and identify which type of school the majority of children in the United States attend.

Answer 3

A public school is one that is free to all children because it is funded by taxpayers; it must educate all students. A charter school is a public school with its own set of standards that is funded and licensed by the state or local district in which it is located; it has control over admissions and expulsions. A private school is one funded by tuition, endowments, and often religious or other nonprofit sponsors. Home schooling is education in which children are taught at home, usually by a parent. The majority of the children in the United States attend public schools.

Question 4

Identify the three ways in which children from low-SES families differ in language compared to children from high-SES families. Then identify and explain the most important factor proven to affect language learning.

Question 5

Describe Vygotsky's beliefs about learning, especially with respect to the zone of proximal development.

Question 6

Explain what Piaget meant by concrete operational thought.

Question 7

Briefly describe the immersion and bilingual education approaches to teaching a second language in the United States.

Question 8

Explain the process of switching codes in speech. Identify the two codes and offer a real-life example of each, including the circumstances under which each code would be typically used.

Question 9

Using concepts from the information-processing view of learning, list and explain the three major steps in the memory process.

Question 10

Define classification and seriation and provide an example for each.