When I started writing this post, I intended to reiterate the points that I made in my first post about the relevance and applicability of Piaget’s ideas and principles, even in the face of new research. His idea of developmental stages and his laying down of what the majority of children can and cannot do at each stage has made it possible for programs like Sesame Street to be as effective as it is in educating the masses. This utilization of the different developmental stages is especially important because as pointed out in the article by Lepper et al., the luxury of having a personal tutor is limited to a select few.
I was going on to talk about how I thought that although it is possible that technology may one day come close to being as good a tutor as a human being, I doubted that a machine could ever be equally effective. As Lepper et al. said, the computer might be able to meet the cognitive requirements for tutoring, but the socioemotional aspect to tutoring seems to be a bit more out of reach. I was then listing a few reasons why I thought the socioemotional aspect would unattainable for computers, and they all revolved around the computer not having Theory of Mind. The more reasons I listed, the more plausible the idea of computers having Theory of Mind actually seemed!
This change of heart occurred when I wanted to say that teaching our young was a biological characteristic, and was a task that could not be taken over by an inanimate object. It struck me then that this was a contradiction to what I had said I my last post about psychological and biological mechanisms being distinct. That being the case, it is possible for a mechanical object to be a mentalistic agent, perceive the mental states of other mentalistic agents, and to react contingently even though it is not a live being.
One of the main barriers to a child’s development of Theory of Mind is the level of inhibitory control needed. Theory of Mind has been found to increase when a child’s inhibitory control increases (Carlson & Moses, 2001). This is because the child needs to repress the most salient beliefs and desires available to them – that of their own – and identify the beliefs and desires of others. Computers would not face these problems because for one, they do not have beliefs and desires of their own per se. Even if they did, computers are machines – they should not have any trouble inhibiting their own “mental states” and prioritizing the input they are receiving about their tutees.
Beliefs and desires are sometimes presented inaccurately on purpose. Computers can be programmed to be especially sensitive to social cues such as facial expressions, body language, and even physiological states. All this information combined might give the computer an even better representation of the tutee’s emotional and mental states than would be available to even the most expert human tutors. Thus, modulating a problem’s subjective and objective difficulties “intuitively” would be possible, and maybe even easier.
It is true that with a human tutor, modifications can be made to teaching styles according to the different personalities of different tutees, and this flexibility might be a problem for computers. Something similar might be accomplished, however, by including a personality inventory with the teaching software, and different teaching styles modeled on the styles used by expert tutors can be utilized appropriately. As for creating playful competition, the fact that many computer games are played against computers, and that children are motivated to do so, show that this aspect of human tutoring is achievable in computers too.
Given the rate of technological advancement today, it is possible that children all over the world will be given the opportunity to have one-on-one tutoring sessions with computers, tailor-made to suit their individual needs, relatively soon. When such a computer or computer software is created, it would be interesting to compare these computer tutors to human tutors to see if the biological feature of human tutors plays an imperative role in expert tutoring, or if psychological mechanisms are sufficient.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Child as "Scientist" and "Apprentice", Aren't They a Bit Of Both?
Throughout this class I have found the idea of children acting as small scientists somewhat fascinating. Just the thought alone that a 10 month old is testing gravity by tossing a stuffed toy from the high chair 30 times in a row is great stuff. I always assumed it was just a simple version of fetch that I was taking part in, when my nephew would make toss after toss, I hadn't a clue that he was doing an investigation.
Some of the points that were made in class gave some support to ideas that until that time I had failed to think of. For example I remember a sand box in my preschool classroom. When I think of preschool children I think of messes, and one doesn't really need to add sand to the equation to see that. But by adding the sand box we were given a jump start to conversion tasks, so it really did have a purpose.
Another point made involved a small child asking question after question, to the point you feel like you are being interrogated by the police. The thing that comes to mind for me here is the scene from "Big Daddy" with Adam Sandler, and the toddler he is taking care of. They are in a rush to make it to McDonald's before they stop serving breakfast, and they encounter a homeless person sitting on the street. The child not knowing what to make of the situation asks the homeless person why he is homeless. The homeless man gives a generic answer and the child responds with "why" and they continue this pattern until the homeless man pretty much gives his life story to Adam Sandler and the child. Even though this was a movie the premise is believable in this scene, the child doesn't understand something and will investigate to reach the answer, I've seen it, and taken part in it before.
But not all the time is the child a "scientist" sometimes they require some help to learn so they are deemed the "apprentice". The best example that I can think of for this is "scaffolding". This occurred the last time my brother brought his kids to town for a visit. I don't have much to entertain small children so they brought some puzzles to work on. His daughter was just starting to work on one, by starting I mean sitting there looking at the pieces not knowing how to get started. Her brother sat down and attached several of the border pieces without saying a word. Jensen took the cue from her older brother and worked on the border before tackling the middle. Without his little bit of help she wouldn't have gotten as far as she did, so I believe that was an example of scaffolding before my eyes.
Another example of the child as the "apprentice" happened the same day as the puzzle incident. In fact it was occurring as Jensen worked on the puzzle. She was coyly told of how hard a puzzle it was and cheered every time she got a piece together with another (I was even encouraged to clap along like I was at some sort of sporting event), and every time the crowd went wild she would just light up as she looked around the room, before diving for another piece. when the puzzle was done her mother was right there to tell her how well she did on that hard puzzle. I believe the emphasis was placed on that particular puzzle, not all puzzles in general (at least I hope so, I'd hate to see her develop some sort of complex like you discussed in class).
Anyways these are just a couple of simple examples of times where I have seen a child as both a "scientist" and "apprentice" so I feel safe to say that children are in fact both.
Some of the points that were made in class gave some support to ideas that until that time I had failed to think of. For example I remember a sand box in my preschool classroom. When I think of preschool children I think of messes, and one doesn't really need to add sand to the equation to see that. But by adding the sand box we were given a jump start to conversion tasks, so it really did have a purpose.
Another point made involved a small child asking question after question, to the point you feel like you are being interrogated by the police. The thing that comes to mind for me here is the scene from "Big Daddy" with Adam Sandler, and the toddler he is taking care of. They are in a rush to make it to McDonald's before they stop serving breakfast, and they encounter a homeless person sitting on the street. The child not knowing what to make of the situation asks the homeless person why he is homeless. The homeless man gives a generic answer and the child responds with "why" and they continue this pattern until the homeless man pretty much gives his life story to Adam Sandler and the child. Even though this was a movie the premise is believable in this scene, the child doesn't understand something and will investigate to reach the answer, I've seen it, and taken part in it before.
But not all the time is the child a "scientist" sometimes they require some help to learn so they are deemed the "apprentice". The best example that I can think of for this is "scaffolding". This occurred the last time my brother brought his kids to town for a visit. I don't have much to entertain small children so they brought some puzzles to work on. His daughter was just starting to work on one, by starting I mean sitting there looking at the pieces not knowing how to get started. Her brother sat down and attached several of the border pieces without saying a word. Jensen took the cue from her older brother and worked on the border before tackling the middle. Without his little bit of help she wouldn't have gotten as far as she did, so I believe that was an example of scaffolding before my eyes.
Another example of the child as the "apprentice" happened the same day as the puzzle incident. In fact it was occurring as Jensen worked on the puzzle. She was coyly told of how hard a puzzle it was and cheered every time she got a piece together with another (I was even encouraged to clap along like I was at some sort of sporting event), and every time the crowd went wild she would just light up as she looked around the room, before diving for another piece. when the puzzle was done her mother was right there to tell her how well she did on that hard puzzle. I believe the emphasis was placed on that particular puzzle, not all puzzles in general (at least I hope so, I'd hate to see her develop some sort of complex like you discussed in class).
Anyways these are just a couple of simple examples of times where I have seen a child as both a "scientist" and "apprentice" so I feel safe to say that children are in fact both.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Computer and Cognitive Development
Toward the end of Thursday’s lecture, we talked about how computer technology can help children in their cognitive development, and this has reminded me of my childhood experiences with computer facilitating programs. Remember when I was in elementary school, we have a computer class which the class will go to the library to learn to use computer. Of course, the computer back then was really old and I don’t quite remember what program that I played with. However, one interesting thing about the class is that we get to play a simulation game about opening a dinosaur park of your own. And starting from choosing land, organizing the park, buying dinosaur and all other business plan, we would need to decide for ourselves the action that we wanted to take. The game required a lot of hard problem solving skills, especially for elementary students, and it was then I realized that not everyone in the class can successfully master the game, and that not everyone’s cognitive development happens at the same age. Personally, I was one of the students struggling with the game and having difficulty to bring my park’s revenue up to a positive number; however, thinking back now, I think the game helped me in developing problem skills as well as training me to be an incremental theorist. I kept on trying each time I failed to open a park, and eventually, I gained enough experience to successfully managing my own business. This experience with the game taught me that success is not determined by innate ability, but with constantly trying and never giving up. I think this is one of reasons that, even until today, I still follow the incremental theory rather than entity theory.
Social Cognition
It is astounding how much children understand about the social world. Children are able to differentiate between themselves and those around them. They have astounding knowledge about human agency and what humans can do that non-human objects can do (Sigler & Alibali, 307). Children are able to move from an understanding of the observable physical characteristics to an understanding of internal psychological traits (Sigler & Alibali, 309). Children are also able to understand to some extent the workings of the human mind: such as goals, intentions, desires and expectations (Sigler & Alibali, 313). Younger children tend to have an understanding of others that is based on the child’s experiences and beliefs and desires (Sigler & Alibali, 318). However as they get older, after three years of age, children seem to be able to differentiate between their own knowledge of the world and that of others (Sigler & Alibali, 318 & 319). They also have knowledge of social categories, such as knowledge about gender and race and ethnicity. The belief is that children have gender schemas, which determine what they view as correct behavior and action for a particular gender (Sigler & Alibali, 334). These schemas are developed and refined by their interactions with others in the society (Sigler & Alibali, 335). Children’s understanding of race also seems to be based on schemas of some sort that are refined and developed more through time (Sigler & Alibali, 336). Their understanding of race, ethnicity, and social class has stages with the child moving from a merely physical understanding of these concepts to a more complex understanding of the ways that various different factors interact and how there is great variability within and throughout these categories (Sigler & Alibali, 337). It is astonishing that children can accomplish all of this but that adults often seem to have a difficult time with social cognition. Children are able to take into account the experiences of others in evaluating what those people will believe and how they will react however; adults often do not take the experiences of others into account. This is evident in the conflict between people of different economic classes or different races and genders because people rarely take the experiences of other’s into account. Perhaps this is because we depend on others when developing our schema and concepts about the world around us. If we are not exposed to the experiences of others or are taught that these experiences are not important than we will not incorporate them into our schemas. Not everyone reaches all the stages in understanding of race, ethnicity, and social class and not everyone has as developed a schema for gender as others. Perhaps as children relying on schemas makes sense but as we get older we need to think beyond our schemas or consider the schemas of others and how they differ from ours and modify ours.
Naive theories of intelligence
The topic that I would like to discuss in this last blog post has to do with Naïve theories of Intelligence. This was pretty interesting for me. I did not know any of this before this class. I really do not agree with the Entity intelligence theory. I am sure that some of this theory is true, but it just does not make that much sense to me. I also feel like this theory could really cripple children’s imitative and drive for school. I feel like if children were labeled with this intelligence then they would underperform children that are classified as Incremental intelligence. I feel that entity intelligence would give certain children an excuse for why they underperform. I also feel that this would only hurt a child if they knew. I just really cannot comprehend this theory because I just cannot understand it. I feel that if you work hard for something that you can achieve it. And under the entity theory intelligence is fixed and does not change. You either have it, or don’t. So why would there be so many people in college if there were people out there that would not benefit from learning? If certain people cannot change how smart they are then why are more people just accepting that they cannot become a genius? I do however; have one piece of evidence in favor of the entity theory. This would be IQ tests. According to researchers your IQ score will stay the same across time. They say that, for the most part, you cannot change your score. It may move up a couple points, (or even move down) but it pretty much stays the same throughout your lifetime. This supports the entity theory. You are born with a certain amount of intelligence and you cannot change that no matter how much you learn, or how much you study. However, I feel that the incremental theory is more correct. It makes much more sense that intelligence is malleable, context dependent, and acquired through experience and hard work. This is how I feel I am. I feel that through hard work I have become more intelligent. Of course it could just be that I was smart to begin with and that just continues. I just feel like the incremental theory fits better. It also makes sense then that within the incremental theory, there is more self-esteem. It seems that people feel better about themselves if they know they can improve something as opposed to “being stuck with what you got.” Again, the answer probably is a mixture of both theories. (Like the nature/nurture debate). There are probably elements of both within intelligence.
Education in schools US versus other countries
In chapter 11: The Development of Academic skills, Siegler and Wagner explain how children acquire basic educational skills such as writing, reading and arithmentics. They state that "children's educations, as well as theories of cognitive development, depend on the mutual influence of intra- and extra-classroom factors." Children not only learn in school but also learn by their social interactions. Family is a big influence in the development of cognitive skills.
In the U.S. children are expected to learn fast and more emphasizes is given on the amount that is learned rather than teaching at a slow pace with greater understanding on one topic rather than a lot. The U.S. where everything moves fast and where everyone expects to get a fast response with everything they do, education is not at the same level compared to other countries. The U.S. fails when it comes to education and a study conducted by the UNICEF, shows that from 24 nations the U.S. was ranked 18 in terms of relative effectiveness of its education system.
I asked myself, why is that one of the richest countries in the world, where a lot of money is put into education, where primary education is free and where class sizes are not too big, why is it that students in grade school perform worse than other countries?
I did some research and found that one of the main reasons why the US is ranked lower than other countries is because here we focus on procedure learning meaning that we teach many things at once while not really focusing on one particular thing. For example when children are taught to add fraction, they are taught how to do it but not much emphasizes is put in the actual concept of fractions. In other countries emphasizes is given on understanding what fractions really are and they tend to break topics in more depth, teaching less but in more depth can help children understand and gives them the opportunity to rehearse what has been learned and is easier to encode into long term memory.
Another big problem that I think we should address is the time parents spend with their children. Parents are usually away from home and children are left by themselves sometimes unattended and with little parental supervision. These children end up doing other things rather than their homework and when parents come home they are often times too tired or not interested in helping their children. In other countries education is a priority for children. Maybe parents should take aside a few hours for their children to do homework because children not only learn in classrooms but also learn by doing homework. Parents play a big role in children's performance in school. I think parents should teach their children to study and should force them to spend a few hours each day doing some educational activity in order to learn good study habits.
I was born in Peru and went to school both here and there. I remember always being behind my classmates when I moved from the US to Peru, but when I would move back here after spending some time in Peru, I would perform better than my American classmates. It is very surprising for most people since Peru is a third world country but I know for a fact that education there and in other countries is better than in the US.
I also see the difference in the way parents push their children to excel in other countries. In other countries where education is not as available as here, parents tend to push and spend more times with their children doing homework. Students tend to show more ambition and motivation because often times they are rewarded in schools for their performance. There is greater competition to excel in other countries while in the US students tend to have less ambition to excel. Perhaps I am wrong but from what I have experienced , education in the US is not so good unless a child goes to a private school. Not until college does education in the US excel compare to other countries but perhaps we should try to focus more on early education rather than just in universities.
Hopefully some education programs can be developed to improve education in the US and hopefully public school will have the same level of education as private school. I think we should focus on children's education more now because they are the future of our country.
In the U.S. children are expected to learn fast and more emphasizes is given on the amount that is learned rather than teaching at a slow pace with greater understanding on one topic rather than a lot. The U.S. where everything moves fast and where everyone expects to get a fast response with everything they do, education is not at the same level compared to other countries. The U.S. fails when it comes to education and a study conducted by the UNICEF, shows that from 24 nations the U.S. was ranked 18 in terms of relative effectiveness of its education system.
I asked myself, why is that one of the richest countries in the world, where a lot of money is put into education, where primary education is free and where class sizes are not too big, why is it that students in grade school perform worse than other countries?
I did some research and found that one of the main reasons why the US is ranked lower than other countries is because here we focus on procedure learning meaning that we teach many things at once while not really focusing on one particular thing. For example when children are taught to add fraction, they are taught how to do it but not much emphasizes is put in the actual concept of fractions. In other countries emphasizes is given on understanding what fractions really are and they tend to break topics in more depth, teaching less but in more depth can help children understand and gives them the opportunity to rehearse what has been learned and is easier to encode into long term memory.
Another big problem that I think we should address is the time parents spend with their children. Parents are usually away from home and children are left by themselves sometimes unattended and with little parental supervision. These children end up doing other things rather than their homework and when parents come home they are often times too tired or not interested in helping their children. In other countries education is a priority for children. Maybe parents should take aside a few hours for their children to do homework because children not only learn in classrooms but also learn by doing homework. Parents play a big role in children's performance in school. I think parents should teach their children to study and should force them to spend a few hours each day doing some educational activity in order to learn good study habits.
I was born in Peru and went to school both here and there. I remember always being behind my classmates when I moved from the US to Peru, but when I would move back here after spending some time in Peru, I would perform better than my American classmates. It is very surprising for most people since Peru is a third world country but I know for a fact that education there and in other countries is better than in the US.
I also see the difference in the way parents push their children to excel in other countries. In other countries where education is not as available as here, parents tend to push and spend more times with their children doing homework. Students tend to show more ambition and motivation because often times they are rewarded in schools for their performance. There is greater competition to excel in other countries while in the US students tend to have less ambition to excel. Perhaps I am wrong but from what I have experienced , education in the US is not so good unless a child goes to a private school. Not until college does education in the US excel compare to other countries but perhaps we should try to focus more on early education rather than just in universities.
Hopefully some education programs can be developed to improve education in the US and hopefully public school will have the same level of education as private school. I think we should focus on children's education more now because they are the future of our country.
Naïve Theories of Intelligence
This class has taught me so much about not only child development but also human cognitive development in general. There are so many topics that I want to write about in this last blog, but the topics that stood out to me was the Naïve Theories of Intelligence. Incremental theorists say that intelligence is flexible and is context dependent and is acquired through in experience and hard work. Entity theorists say that intelligence is fixed or stable, resulting on a person either having it or not. I believe it’s a combination of both. I’ve struggled watching some of my friends party the night before an exam while I stay in and study, only to watch them get higher scores than me. So in my case, I would agree with the Incremental theorists simply because the theory of intelligence from the entity theorists perspective would pretty much assume I will never succeed. I have always been the type of person that goes above and beyond with studying but still gets average grades.
I believe my inability to go through school with ease comes from the way I was brought up. We have learned so much about how important family interaction is with a child’s learning and it made me realize the lack of it that came from my family. It just shows how different cultures are when it comes to values and raising a child. I was born in the Philippines and don’t recall ever doing things with my parents such as play games and regular housework with them. My parents were always so busy with work that I ended up spending most my time playing and interacting with my brothers. Then at age six my family moved to Oregon and my transition was a little difficult because my parents didn’t know English very well. So it was hard to go to school ad learn so much but not have what I learned exercised at home.
I think the entity theory of intelligence is somewhat similar to the administration and results of tests in classes. You either do well or you don’t. What it doesn’t account for is how much effort you put into your work. The idea of tests also reminds me of basic computer tutors that say “you right” or “your wrong.” Lepper’s article says that even if a computer could accurately diagnose the student’s affective state and respond to that state there is still a plausibility problem. The plausibility (acceptability) problem is, if the same actions and the same statements that human tutors use will have the same effect if delivered by a computer. The emotional response is taken away if a computer replaces a human and this could cause issues when trying to tutor a child.
I believe my inability to go through school with ease comes from the way I was brought up. We have learned so much about how important family interaction is with a child’s learning and it made me realize the lack of it that came from my family. It just shows how different cultures are when it comes to values and raising a child. I was born in the Philippines and don’t recall ever doing things with my parents such as play games and regular housework with them. My parents were always so busy with work that I ended up spending most my time playing and interacting with my brothers. Then at age six my family moved to Oregon and my transition was a little difficult because my parents didn’t know English very well. So it was hard to go to school ad learn so much but not have what I learned exercised at home.
I think the entity theory of intelligence is somewhat similar to the administration and results of tests in classes. You either do well or you don’t. What it doesn’t account for is how much effort you put into your work. The idea of tests also reminds me of basic computer tutors that say “you right” or “your wrong.” Lepper’s article says that even if a computer could accurately diagnose the student’s affective state and respond to that state there is still a plausibility problem. The plausibility (acceptability) problem is, if the same actions and the same statements that human tutors use will have the same effect if delivered by a computer. The emotional response is taken away if a computer replaces a human and this could cause issues when trying to tutor a child.
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