Invitation%20to%20the%20Life%20Span%20by%20Kathleen%20Stassen%20Berger

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Invitation to the Life Spanby Kathleen Stassen
Berger

• Chapter 7- Middle Childhood
• Body and Mind

PowerPoint Slides developed by Martin Wolfger
and Michael James Ivy Tech Community
College-Bloomington
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A Healthy Time

• The average 7- to 11-year-old gains about 2
  inches (5 centimeters) and 5 pounds (2.2
  kilograms) per year.
• Healthy 7-year-olds tend to be agile and neither
  too heavy nor too thin.
• After age 6, the rate of muscle growth slows.
  Children master any motor skills that dont
  require adult-sized bodies.

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A Healthy Time

• Asthma
• A chronic disease of the respiratory system in
  which inflammation narrows the airways from the
  nose and mouth to the lungs, causing difficulty
  in breathing. Signs and symptoms include
  wheezing, shortness of breath, chest tightness,
  and coughing.
• Some experts suggest a hygiene hypothesis for the
  current increase in all allergies, from peanuts
  (an allergen for about 1 percent of U.S.
  children) to cockroach droppings (a trigger for
  asthma).

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A Healthy Time

• Obesity
• Many 7- to 11-year-olds eat too much, exercise
  too little, and become overweight or obese as a
  result.
• Body mass index (BMI)- The ratio of weight to
  height, calculated by dividing a persons body
  weight in kilograms by the square of his or her
  height in meters.
• Overweight- In an adult, having a BMI of 25 to
  29. In a child, having a BMI above the 85th
  percentile, according to the U.S. Centers for
  Disease Controls 1980 standards for children of
  a given age.
• Obesity- In an adult, having a BMI of 30 or more.
  In a child, having a BMI above the 95th
  percentile, according to the U.S. Centers for
  Disease Controls 1980 standards for children of
  a given age.

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A Healthy Time
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A Healthy Time

• Physical Activity
• Benefits
• Better overall health, including less asthma
• Less obesity
• Appreciation of cooperation and fair play
• Improved problem-solving ability
• Respect for teammates and opponents of many
  ethnicities and nationalities

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A Healthy Time

• But there are hazards as well
• Loss of self-esteem because of critical teammates
  or coaches.
• Injuries (the infamous "Little League elbow" is
  one example).
• Prejudice (especially against the other sex).
• Increases in stress (evidenced by altered hormone
  levels, insomnia.

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Theories About Cognition

• Piaget and School-Age Children
• Concrete operational thought- Piagets term for
  the ability to reason logically about direct
  experiences and perceptions.
• Classification- The logical principle that things
  can be organized into groups (or categories or
  classes) according to some characteristic they
  have in common.
• Transitive inference- The ability to figure out
  (infer) the unspoken link (transfer) between one
  fact and another.

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Theories About Cognition

• Seriation- The idea that things can be arranged
  in a series. Seriation is crucial for
  understanding the number sequence.
• Contemporary developmentalists find that, in some
  ways, Piaget was mistaken. The research does not
  confirm a sudden shift between preoperational and
  concrete operational thought.
• What develops during middle childhood is the
  ability to use mental categories and
  subcategories flexibly, inductively, and
  simultaneously.

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Theories About Cognition

• Vygotsky and School Age Children
• Whereas Piaget emphasized the childs discovery,
  Vygotsky regarded instruction as essential.
• In guiding each child through his or her zone of
  proximal development, or almost-understood ideas,
  other people are crucial.
• Children are "apprentices in learning" as they
  play with each other, watch television, eat
  dinner with their families, and engage in other
  daily interactions.
• Language is integral as a mediator, a vehicle for
  understanding and learning.

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Theories About Cognition

• Information-processing theory
• A perspective that compares human thinking
  processes, by analogy, to computer analysis of
  data, including sensory input, connections,
  stored memories, and output.
• Selective attention- The ability to concentrate
  on some stimuli while ignoring others.
• Automatization- A process in which repetition of
  a sequence of thoughts and actions makes the
  sequence routine, so that it no longer requires
  conscious thought.
• Reaction time- The time it takes to respond to a
  stimulus, either physically (with a reflexive
  movement such as an eye blink) or cognitively
  (with a thought).

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Theories About Cognition

• Sensory memory- The component of the information
  processing system in which incoming stimulus
  information is stored for a split second to allow
  it to be processed. (Also called the sensory
  register.)
• Working memory- The component of the information
  processing system in which current, conscious
  mental activity occurs. (Also called short-term
  memory.)
• Long-term memory- The component of the
  information processing system in which virtually
  limitless amounts of information can be stored
  indefinitely.

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Theories About Cognition

• Working memory improves steadily and
  significantly every year from age 4 to 15 years.
• The capacity of long-term memory is virtually
  limitless by the end of middle childhood.
• Memory storage (how much information is deposited
  in the brain) expands over childhood, but more
  important is retrieval (how readily stored
  material can be brought into working memory).
• As the prefrontal cortex matures, children are
  better able to use strategies to help them
  remember.
• Retrieval becomes more efficient and accurate.

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Theories About Cognition

• Metacognition- "Thinking about thinking" the
  ability to evaluate a cognitive task in order to
  determine how best to accomplish it, and then to
  monitor and adjust ones performance on that
  task.
• Metamemory- The ability to understand how memory
  works in order to use it well. Metamemory is an
  essential element of metacognition.

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Learning in School

• Teaching Values
• In some nations, every public school teaches
  religion.
• In the United States, most children who attend
  private school (10 percent) or who are
  home-schooled (2 percent) learn specific
  religious content.
• Among the other specifics taught in some schools
  are evolution and sex education, both ideas that
  most Americans want children to learn but some
  parents do not.
• Hidden curriculum- The unofficial, unstated, or
  implicit rules and priorities that influence the
  academic curriculum and every other aspect of
  learning in school.

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Learning in School

• Learning Language
• By age 6, children know most of the basic
  vocabulary and grammar of their first language,
  and many speak a second or even a third language.
• Some school-age children learn as many as 20 new
  words a day and apply grammar rules they did not
  use before.

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Learning in School

• Directly related to language learning is another
  capacity of the school-age child, the ability to
  switch from one manner of speaking, or language
  code, to another.
• Each language code differs in tone,
  pronunciation, gesture, sentence length, idiom,
  grammar, and vocabulary.
• Sometimes people switch from the formal code
  (used in academic contexts) to the informal code
  (used with friends).
• Many children use a third code in text messaging,
  with numbers (411), abbreviations (LOL), and
  emoticons (_at_).

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Learning in School

• Learning Language
• Should immigrant children be required to speak
  only Standard English in school right from the
  beginning, or should they be educated in their
  native language in the early grades?
• English-language learner (ELL)- A child who is
  learning English as a second language.
• In the United States, some school districts offer
  bilingual education (teaching in two languages)
  others provide ESL (English as a second language)
  instruction and others offer only immersion, in
  which children are taught exclusively in a
  language that is not spoken at home.

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Learning in School

• The Reading Wars
• Phonics approach- Teaching reading by first
  teaching the sounds of each letter and of various
  letter combinations.
• Whole-language approach- Teaching reading by
  encouraging early use of all language
  skills-talking and listening, reading and
  writing.
• A focus on phonics need not undercut instruction
  that motivates children to read, write, and
  discuss with their classmates and their parents.

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Learning in School

• The Math Wars
• Historically, math was taught by rote children
  memorized number facts, such as the
  multiplication tables, and filled page after page
  of workbooks.
• In reaction against this approach, many
  educators, inspired especially by Piaget and
  Vygotsky, sought to make math instruction more
  active and engaging- less a matter of
  memorization than of discovery.

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Measuring the Mind

• Aptitude- The potential to master a specific
  skill or to learn a certain body of knowledge.
• IQ test- A test designed to measure intellectual
  aptitude, or ability to learn in school.
  Originally, intelligence was defined as mental
  age divided by chronological age, times
  100--hence the term intelligence quotient, or IQ.
• Achievement test- A measure of mastery or
  proficiency in reading, mathematics, writing,
  science, or some other subject.

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Measuring the Mind

• Measuring Aptitude
• The most important aptitude for school-age
  children is intellectual aptitude, or the ability
  to learn in school, which is usually measured by
  an IQ test.
• Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC)-
  An IQ test designed for school-age children. The
  test assesses potential in many areas, including
  vocabulary, general knowledge, memory, and
  spatial comprehension.
• Flynn effect - The rise in average IQ scores that
  has occurred over the decades in many nations.
• Mental retardation- Literally, slow, or late,
  thinking. In practice, people are considered
  mentally retarded if they score below 70 on an IQ
  test and if they are markedly behind their peers
  in the ability to meet the basic requirements of
  daily life.

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Measuring the Mind

• Measuring Achievement Within the United States
• No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act- A U.S. law
  enacted in 2001 that was intended to increase
  accountability in education by requiring states
  to qualify for federal educational funding by
  administering standardized tests to measure
  school achievement.
• National Assessment of Educational Progress
  (NAEP)- An ongoing and nationally representative
  measure of U.S. childrens achievement in
  reading, mathematics, and other subjects over
  time nicknamed "the nations report card."

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Measuring the Mind

• International Achievement Test Scores
• Literacy Study (PIRLS)- Inaugurated in 2001, a
  planned five-year cycle of international trend
  studies in the reading ability of fourth-graders.
• Trends in Math and Science Study (TIMSS)- An
  international assessment of the math and science
  skills of fourth- and eighth-graders. Although
  the TIMSS is very useful, different countries
  scores are not always comparable because sample
  selection, test administration, and content
  validity are hard to keep uniform.

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Measuring the Mind

• Developmental Psychopathology
• The field that uses insights into typical
  development to understand and remediate
  developmental disorders, and vice versa.
• Children with special needs- Children who,
  because of a physical or mental disability,
  require extra help in order to learn.
• Education of children with special needs is most
  beneficial when it begins early but availability
  of programs varies within and among nations.

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Measuring the Mind
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Measuring the Mind

• Several lessons from developmental
  psychopathology apply to everyone
• 1. Abnormality is normal. Most people sometimes
  act oddly, and those with serious disabilities
  are, in many respects, like everyone else.
• 2. Disability changes year by year Someone who
  is severely disabled at one stage may become
  quite capable later on, or vice versa.

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Measuring the Mind

• 3. Adulthood may be better or worse than
  childhood. Prognosis is difficult. Many infants
  and children with serious disabilities that
  affect them psychologically (e.g., blindness)
  become happy and productive adults. Conversely,
  some conditions become more disabling at
  maturity, when interpersonal skills become more
  important.
• 4. Diagnosis depends on the social context.
  According to the widely used Diagnostic and
  Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
  (DSM-IV-TR), "nuances of an individuals cultural
  frame of reference" must be considered before a
  diagnosis is rendered(American Psychiatric
  Association, 2000, p. xxxiv).

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Measuring the Mind

• Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
  Disorders (DSM-IV-TR)
• The American Psychiatric Associations official
  guide to the diagnosis (not treatment) of mental
  disorders. (IV-TR means "fourth edition, text
  revision).
• The fifth edition is scheduled to be published in
  2011.

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Measuring the Mind

• Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)-
  A condition in which a person is inattentive,
  impulsive, and overactive and thus has great
  difficulty concentrating for more than a few
  moments.
• Comorbidity- The presence of two or more
  unrelated disease conditions at the same time in
  the same person.

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Measuring the Mind

• Learning disability- A marked delay in a
  particular area of learning that is not caused by
  an apparent physical disability, by mental
  retardation, or by an unusually stressful home
  environment.
• Dyslexia- Unusual difficulty with reading
  thought to be the result of some neurological
  underdevelopment.

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Measuring the Mind

• Autistic spectrum disorder- Any of several
  disorders characterized by impaired
  communication, inadequate social skills, and
  unusual patterns of play.
• Autism- A developmental disorder marked by an
  inability to relate to other people normally,
  extreme self-absorption, and an inability to
  acquire normal speech.
• Asperger syndrome- An autistic spectrum disorder
  characterized by extreme attention to details and
  deficient social understanding.

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Measuring the Mind