Social Constructivist Perspective - Assignment Example

Review Questions Part A: Topics 3 Q1. Self esteem and learning outcomes It is true that the relation ship between teachers and their pupils play a big role in determining the pupils self concept. Self concept is the set of attitudes and knowledge that one normally has about himself. The concept that one has of himself also affects their self esteem. In my own experience, there are those teachers who have a healthy relationship with students, and this enables the students to have better self esteem, but there are also those students who have bad experiences with their teachers, and this affects their esteem (Westwood, 2008). For instance, if a teacher is mean and does not like a certain student, say because he is not very good at a certain subject, the student will feel demotivated and is likely to believe that he is an underachiever. However, if the teacher supports a student who is not good at a certain subject, the student’s self esteem is likely to improve, and this may help him perform better in the said subject. A student’s self concept is likely to affect their academic performance and achievement in two different ways. Those students who have a positive self concept normally display more confidence in class and are likely to grasp the concepts taught to them very quickly. However, students with negative self concepts have little or no belief or confidence in their abilities, and this is reflected in their fear of learning new concepts and understanding classroom activities (Malmgren and Trezek, 2009). A teacher should be fully involved in the learning process of all students. He should be there to offer guidance where the students show signs of weakness of lack of confidence. He should encourage good performance and not expect only what students are able to deliver in terms of learning. Q2. Social Constructivist Perspective and Students with Disabilities The social constructivist model deals with people constructing new knowledge from their interactions with other people. This is a learning perspective that focuses on the interdependence of individual and social processes in the construction of understanding and knowledge. Dudley-Marling says that learning problems exist in the minds of individual learners. The model focuses on self directed learning, which can also be considered to be a student-centered kind of learning. The social constructivist perspective emphasizes that the teacher should act as a facilitator, and not the traditional teacher, in the learning process of students. In the case of students with disabilities, it is the facilitator role to guide and create an environment for the learner to arrive at his own conclusions. Students with disabilities may suffer from negative self concepts or low self esteem, and therefore, they need proper guidance so that they may have the confidence to structure their own knowledge (Westwood, 2008). It is the job of the facilitator, or coach to guide such students to realize their capabilities in knowledge construction. Q3. Expected and unexpected Underachievement and the Effect of Reading Instruction or Remedial Interventions Expected underachievement refers to the situation where a student is expected to perform poorly as a result of social economic disadvantage, sensory and behavioral disorders and inadequate instructions. Unexpected underachievement on the other hand occurs when a student’s opportunities, intelligence and health do not reflect in how he performs while in school. This disconnect here occurs when the highly intelligent and well taught student provides low grades. Reading instructions or remedial interventions can have lasting impacts on both kinds of academic underachievers. Reading instructions can help expected underachievers with reading disabilities to catch up with their peers who are not disabled and maybe even score the same grades. Remedial interventions such as counseling is useful in helping those expected and unexpected underachievers whose performance is being affected by factors such as social economic problems. These interventions are necessary in enhancing the learning outcomes of students and enabling them to perform better than they are (Malmgren and Trezek, 2009). Q4. How difficulties in speech skills and broader language abilities impact on reading Difficulty in speech is a disability that prevents fluency in reading for many students. Speech and language skills are central in enabling students interact with their peers and other people. Children who are able to talk properly normally have the confidence to about life without feeling inadequate. However, those children who have speech problems normally have a confidence deficiency such that they cannot do the usual things that children without speech problems can do. Speech skills has significant impact on the reading activities of students. If a student has speech problems, then their reading will be negatively impacted. Such students normally have poor word intonation and they also lack in proper pronunciation skills (Westwood, 2008). Therefore, they are likely not to understand what they read, and this affects their academic performance. Part B: Topics 4-6 Q1. What does decoding mean and how do decoding skills support reading comprehension? Decoding is the term used to describe how learners apply their knowledge of letters to pronounce words correctly. The learners must know the different sound relationships and comprehend letter patterns in order for them to make the proper pronunciations of written words. Decoding is a skill that helps students recognize new and old words. With these skills it becomes easy for the students to understand whatever it is that they are reading. Without decoding skills, it would be hard for learners to correctly pronounce words in any text, thus they would not understand much of what is written (Westwood, 2008). Q2. Why is reading fluency important? Reading fluency is the ability to read fast and with accuracy. Reading fluency is important as it enables the learner to automatically group and recognize words. In other words, it helps in creating a link between the recognition of words and reading comprehension. Learners with fluency skills do not have to worry about decoding words, but instead, they concentrate on the meaning of the text they are reading. Fluency allows learners to connect what they are reading to what they know, or what they may have experienced in their personal lives. Fluent readers are able to recognize words and at the same time, they are able to understand their meanings as well. Reading fluency also allows learners to freely express themselves and interact with their peers (Malmgren& Trezek,2009). They can establish meaning from texts and they can confidently pass on or share their perspectives on written work. Q3. What is the difference between phonological awareness and phonemic awareness and how do these competencies affect children’s reading? Phonological awareness focuses on the unit of sound of words or the awareness of word syllables. Phonemic awareness on the other hand refers to the recognition of individual sounds. Phonemic awareness is very important in the reading process as it enables children to recognize how words sound when they are spoken. This is helpful when the child learns to read and write as he can identify which letters are appropriate for certain words. For instance, the learner will know that the words rat and bat may have similar sound in the middle and at the end, but they have different sounding letters at the beginning. Learners need to know the relationship between the unit of sound and the sound of letters in words, they will have a hard time understanding the word’s meaning (Snowling and Hulme, 2006). Q4. What is meant by grapheme-phoneme correspondence and the alphabetic principle and what impact do difficulties in these areas have on a students reading ability? Grapheme-phoneme correspondence refers to how sounds (phoneme) and letters(grapheme) relate to each other. The grapheme-phoneme correspondence underscores the link between word sounds and the letters that represent those sounds. For instance, the sound /d/ is represented by the letter ‘d’ and letter ‘m’ represents the sound/m/. In some instances, some sounds can be represented by more than one letter. For example, the sound /k/ can be represented by the letter ‘k’ in kick, and by the letter ‘c’ in can. Alphabetical principle on the other hand refers to the understanding that speech can be turned into written words and vise versa (Nielson, 2009). This is to say that speech sounds that are based on the relationship between symbols, letters and spoken words can be represented by symbols comprised of letters and letter combinations. Learners need to understand the differences and similarities of the two areas so that they do not get confused when learning sounds represented by different letters. Learners need to be taught how to relate spoken sound to written letters so that they do not have to have a hard time decoding, reading fluently or even comprehending text (Snowling and Hulme, 2006). Q5. What does it mean to read an unfamiliar word by analogy? Give an example of some words you could read using this method. Reading in analogy is the use of the spelling-sound pattern of a certain word and using it as a basis for identifying the spelling-sound of another word. Reading by analogies enables children to recognize words that might not be too familiar by making use of or remembering the words that they already know. For instance, a person who has seen and knows the sounds associated with the word ‘man’ will not have a problem recognizing the word ‘can’. Similarly, some one who is familiar with the word ‘read’ will be able to recognize and pronounce the word ‘lead’ very well (Westwood, 2008). Other words that can be read by analogy include: tie, die, pie, weak, leak, peak, feet, meet, boy, toy, coy, west, best, jest, pest, tame, fame, lame, born, worn, torn, corn, wall, call, ball and fall, bat, fat, cat, rain, vain, main and pain. Q6. Describe the key elements of ‘best practice’ in early reading instruction and explain why these practices are important for children who struggle to learn to read. In early reading, learners need to develop those skills and abilities that will help them further develop reading skills. Developing these skills and abilities can be considered as best practice in early reading instruction. Some of the elements of this best practice include phonemic awareness, alphabet principle and fluency, decoding abilities, spelling, vocabulary and writing skills, comprehension ability as well as language skills. Phonemic awareness involves getting the learner to know the unit of sound in the spoken language. This allows the children to understand more about the oral language so that they can apply their knowledge into the understanding of the written language. This skill is taught in kindergarten or grade one as it enhances reading and spelling skills, thus preventing future reading and comprehension in other grades (Snowling and Hulme, 2006). Another element of best practice is alphabetic principle and fluency. Learners must have confident, speedy and accurate recognition so that they are able to learn about word spelling and letter sounds. Fluency enables learners to comprehend a text without dwelling too much on its sounds. Decoding is another element of best practice which every learner should have. Learners should be encouraged to get stories, books and other reading materials that will help them gain information and enhance their reading and comprehension skills. Spelling and writing skills are also quite important as elements of best practice in early childhood education. Getting learners to develop their comprehension skills also plays an important role in childhood reading. For children who are struggling to read, comprehension skills can be provided by encouraging broad-range reading and participating in discussions about reading materials. Another element of good practice aimed at improving learning for poor readers is the attainment of language skills. According to Nielson (2009), language skills can be improved by encouraging learners to read widely, engage is story telling or discussions of reading material and writing purposefully. Q7. Greaney’s suggestion of the Phonological Cue Teachers in Australia mainly use context cues to deal with the issue of unfamiliar words among their students. However, Greaney (2001) argues that phonological –based cues is the best way to go about solving this problem. He says that context based cues are known not to encourage the automatic identification of some words, but phonological-based cues can. Phonological sues are based on the idea that learning specific words and sounding them out and decoding meaning by analogy are the best ways of enhancing early reading and comprehension among learners. I support Greaney’s views that phonological cues are the way to go when it comes to enhancing the comprehension of the meanings of new words among learners. Initial teaching of words to new learners demands that the instructor lets them know and understand their different meaning and sounds so that they know their exact meanings. As the learners continue learning new words, they are likely to come across even more complex words, and this requires decoding skills. This will enable them identify the new words and they will not have a difficult time comprehending what they are reading. I agree that the use of context cues does not achieve much as compared to phonological cues when it comes to tackling the problem of unfamiliar words. Therefore, teachers should adopt the use of phonological cues as a way of helping their students develop fluency and comprehension without a problem. References Dudley-Marling,C.(2004).The social construction of learning disabilities, Journal of learning didabilities,37, 6482-489. Greaney, K (2001). An investigation of teacher performances for word identification strategies. Journal Of Learning Disabilities, 44(3), 234-46 Malmgren, K.W & Trezek, B. J (2009). Literacy Instruction for secondary students with difficulties.Focus on Exceptional Children, 41(6),1-12. Neilson,R (2009). Assessment of phonological awareness in low progress readers. Australian Journal of Learning disabilities,14(1),53-66. Snowling, M.J. &Hulme, C (2006).Learning skills. Learning to read and reading intervention. London Review of Education, 4(1)63-76 Westwood, P.(2008). What teachers need to know about reading and writing difficulties: Chapter 2: Reading difficulties at word level, (pp 14-29). Read More