In this weeks reading of Woolfolk chapter one I learned exactly what educational psychology and what it involves. Educational psychologist do a lot of if not only research on learning and teaching and at the same time work to improve educational practice (Pintrich, 2000). This chapter also goes on to talk about all the different methods of research such as ethnography, case study, the different types of correlation, and random research to name a few. As a psychology major this is not how I want to use my psychology degree, while this might work for some people I do not want to spend my days completing assessments and research in the classroom. I want to help students over challenges and be a source of motivation and encouragement. I want to help a child make this discovery that education is key to their future or help students deal with life's challenges. with that being said I am not sure school psychology is the place for me.
In chapter two we read about the different theories of development from Piaget and Vygotsky. We also read the brain and how it develops for example on p.39 we read about an example of how our amygdala is connected to our emotions. On p.39 we are given the example of how a female student has answered a couple of math questions wrong in front of the class, so once she is asked go up to the board she becomes fearful because of the past incidents therefore her ability to concentrate has been disrupted the part of her brain that is working is the amygdala which is causing some anxiety.
in chapter three we read about puberty and how it affects males and females differently. I did learn that females stop growing much sooner than the boys girls will usually stop growing in height by the age of 16 while some males will grow till about about the age of 19, I also learned that height might also depend on ethnicity as well. throughout chapter three we also read about obesity and how this is a growing problem in our nation Woolfolk gives us reality of this growing problem with statistics on how over the years obesity is growing in children and adolescents ages 2-19 (p.73)
Field Experience
I have done some hours at a school located in Dolton this school services the south suburban area of Calumet City, Dolton, and Markham, to name a few. The Pace Program is an alternative school which is part of a co-op Echo Program. The Teacher I am observing is Ms. Vanessa Martinez, she is an 8th grade teacher with about 9 students. This is a special education classroom with students who all have an IEP with academic and functional goal settings. all except one male student have learning disorders, behavioral disorders, and or emotional disorders.
Ms. Martinez has a very structured class with instruction through out the entire day she says without this structure he students would go off track and become restless in some cases even becoming violent. I witness a lot of hands on activities, for example the days I was there we worked on a science lesson the topic was "Global warming how is this affecting different habitats"
To begin the students were given a word search to introduce the vocabulary words they would be using. Ms. Martinez also uses power points to discuss the vocabulary words so that her students will fully understand the issues they will be learning about. My experience was good I was not sure if my presence was going to trow off their day and if her students would find it difficult to concentrate, this was not the case at all the students were interested in learning the lesson and I think they were just really excited as they are getting ready for their eighth grade graduation and start summer vacation so while there are some group activities students tend to drift off topic so I had to keep reminding them what we were working on. Over all it was an interesting few days.
