Learning Theories

I am so excited for the opportunity to get into the classroom.  I love the hands on teaching experience from the beginning of my schooling.  I am very lucky to get to see two classrooms and how they are run.  I am observing Mrs. Beck's first grade class at Thunder Ridge Elementary and Mrs. Whipple's fifth grade class at Meadow Elementary.  I had a chance to observe a little at both places this week and saw a lot of these theories in affect.

Mrs. Whipple's class was working on a project this week which had them working on their own most of the time.  I was able to observe Mrs. Whipple use the theory of behaviorism.  After she explained the instructions and answered questions for the assignment, she let the kids know that she would be playing music and they could visit as long as they could hear the music.  If it got loud and she had to give them three strikes they would have to work silently.  For the most part the kids were compliant.  They did get a couple strikes over time but never lost the privilege.

I noticed that with the older grades the use of behaviorism and other theories are harder to observe as the kids can work more freely on their own.  But, in the first grade classroom there was much more use of all three theories.  In order to keep the kids attention and behavior in check she would use many types of behaviorism and cognitivism.  The things I observed regarding behaviorism were that she had Beck dollars which were given for good behavior and taken if there were distractions like kids asking to go to the bathroom multiple times.  I saw her use a timer to say that the had five minutes to finish a project.  Mrs. Beck is great with structure and consistency and this I feel is done through great use of behaviorism in her class.  She uses cognitivism as she teaches the days of the week and the months of the year through music but also teaches them to read a calendar and say the day and date also.  I was also able to see her use constructivism as she has a morning routine where they sing a song and introduce themselves to others in the class.  In the song they sing, they have to shake hands and look people in the eye and say there name and move on to the next person.

I was so glad to see two teachers who are very involved with their class and making sure they are not just learning information but skills for life.