Piaget's Impact on Education

Piaget’s theory and beliefs have affected education greatly throughout the years. For example, Piaget believed that it is not possible to “teach” a child out of one stage and into another. He also said that children advance through stages at different speeds. Therefore, there have been many educational programs built on the belief that children should be taught at the level for which they are developmentally prepared. Many instructional strategies have also been derived from the knowledge obtained through Piaget’s theory. Some of these instructional strategies are providing a supportive environment, utilizing social interaction with peer teaching, and helping children see fallacies and inconsistencies in their thinking. Another part of Piaget’s theory was that a child had schemas, which are mental building blocks. As the child obtains more schemas, they start mental mapping.

Lev Vygotsky

I have had scaffolding used in my math class almost every year. Ussualy, the first week or two of math class if pretty easy because the teacher is reviewing information that I already learned in my previous math class. After the first week or two, the teacher starts teaching the class new information, using the material were reviewing. As the year goes on we ussualy use every new piece of information to to build up to something more complicated. In conclusion, in the beginning of the year, my math teacher would start out by going over knowledge that I already had from my actual development, and then would use that knoweledge to teach me new things, helping me to reach my potential development.

Bandura

I agree with most aspects of Bandura's social cognition theory. I agree with Bandura's idea that imitation is a powerful force. It makes sence to me that a child would learn through observing and learning from others around them. If a child was never around other people who were speaking, then they would never develop the ability to say speak even simple words such as dada. I also agree with bandura that people have the ability to to learn something they see or hear, even if this thing does not fulfill a need that they are currently seeking or if they are not rewarded. In Bandura's theory, he states that "the seed has been planted for later use when appropriate." Although I agree that a person has the ability to learn, even if it does not fulfill what they are currently seeking, I do not believe that they will remember what they learn if it goes unused for a long amount of time. Lastly, I agree with Bandura that new behaviors mostly come from a combination of previous learned behaviors. For example, a child with older siblings will most likely learn different behaviors from each of his/her siblings, and as a result, his/her behavior will be a combination of the older sibling's behaviors.