Midterm Reflection Blog: Understanding, Learning, and Motivation
Section I: The Developing Learner – Understanding the “Who”One concept that stood out to me was Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). In my own words, ZPD is the gap between what a learner can do independently and what they can achieve with guidance or support. It emphasizes the importance of scaffolding, where teachers provide […]
Section I: The Developing Learner — Who Students Are Before the Lesson Even Starts
Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) is one of those concepts that sounds complicated at first but really isn’t. It’s basically the idea that learning happens best when students are pushed a little past what they can do alone, but not so far that they panic. That middle zone is where help actually matters. Another […]
Psych Essentials
By: Imani Hadden Understanding How Students Grow, Think, and Believe in Themselves As this semester comes to a close, educational psychology has reshaped the way I think of learning. Learning is more than a memorization of facts and finishing of assignments; it is connected with students’ social development, the way students think through problems, and […]
My Final Thoughts
As the semester comes to a close, I’ve found myself thinking a lot about how much this educational psychology course has changed the way I understand learning and teaching. Before this class, I mostly saw teaching as delivering information in a clear way. Now, I realize that effective teaching starts with understanding students as individuals, […]
How the semester went… – Ryan Schmidt
No particular reason for Sigmund Freud to be here, I just think he is interesting as a person and theorist. That said, we do have him to thank for the genesis of psychodevelopmental stages as a theory (see discussion of Erikson’s stages below), even if he was archaic in retrospect. Introduction To quickly preface, this […]
Ed Psych Essentials Final — Isabella George
Section I: The Developing Learner — Understanding the “Who” If I’ve learned anything this semester, it’s that teaching is about meeting students where they are, developmentally, socially, and emotionally. One concept that resonated with me deeply is Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)—the space between what a learner can do independently and what they can […]
Educational Psychology Essentials (Final Reflection) by Jeremiah Ray
Section I: The Developing Learner: Understanding the “Who” The concept of group differences in the education setting is very important. As a teacher, you are going to have students that come from many different walks of life, practice different religions, speak different languages, eat different types of food, wear different types of clothes, and more. […]
Educational Psychology Final: Alex King
Section I: The Developing Learner: Understanding the “Who” Group differences are basically the differences in traits or abilities between different groups of individuals. This can include, but is not limited to, race, gender, age, sexuality, religion, or socioeconomic background. In psychology, group differences are studied due to how culture, location, and societal expectations can change […]
Educational Psychology Final Aidan Aguilera
Section 1 One concept in understanding learners is Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development. Although originally developed earlier, Piaget remains widely used in modern education to explain how children’s thinking develops. Most 10-year-olds fall within the operational stage, meaning they can think logically about concrete information but struggle with abstract reasoning (Slavin, 2020). At this stage, […]
Ed Psych Essentials: By Ben Swanson
Section One: The Learner — How Students Grow and Differ One concept that stood out to me a lot was Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development. Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). ZPD is the sweet spot between what a child can do alone and what they can do with guidance. In this zone learning should […]