Category Archives: 1.4 Prof. Commitment

Theories of Language Development

The earliest theories of language were initially based on the “nonsense” idea that imitation is
how children learn a language. It does play a part, but only a small one. Toddlers who copy the way adults speak are the ones who show the most rapid vocabulary development, but only in the first 1/2 years of the language explosion. It doesn’t account for all language acquisition, therefore we cannot say that this is the way children learn. It also doesn’t add up, as it cannot possibly account for a child’s ability to create new words and expressions which they have never heard before.

Skinner’s (1957) reinforcement there argues that parents play a bigger role than just imitation. They are vital in the process of shaping language, gradually improving a child’s speech. However, researchers have found that when parents speak to children, there is no evidence of this shaping, making this a very controversial theory. In contrast to this, (Brown & Hanlon, 1970; Hirsh-Pasek, Trieman, & Schneiderman, 1984), found that parents actually construct children vocabulary in a range of different ways. The most common, when they correct them on the basis of whether they are correct or not.

Developmentalists can tell which children have parents who talk and read to them often, as they use a wider range of vocabulary in their speech. They also tend to begin talking sooner, and developing larger vocabularies quicker. This makes it evident that a child who hears a larger quantity of language is more likely to benefit in this way. Children who don’t hear such a large quantity of language in their early years don’t even appear to catch up in their later years.It has also been found by the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test, that poor mothers talk and read to their children less and also use much poorer vocabulary and complex sentences. Catherine Snow (1997) found that children at four years of age brought up in poverty, use shorter/less complex sentences than their better-off peers. Obviously there are other contributing factors, but the variety of language a child hears is fundamental in their language development.

Motherese, is the simple language adults use to talk to children. It is now referred to as infant-directed speech. This is done so in a higher-pitched voice and also at a much slower pace. It is believed that babies can tell the difference between people speaking in infant-directed speech and normal speech as early as a few days old. Developmentalists have also found that they prefer to be spoken to in motherese. They like the higher pitch as it catches their attention.

There are a few issues with the theory of language acquisition. Children who hear their own sentence repeated back to them grammatically correct will learn correct grammar sooner, but recastings are actually really rare (and children still acquire complex grammar eventually. Also, mothers do appear in a range of countries and cultures, it is not evident in all. (Better, 1988) also found that motherese is not used very much by mothers suffering from depression. These children still learn the language and grammar, proving that whilst infant-directed speech does play an important role, it is not always necessary.

Nativist Theorists argue that all a child needs to learn language is already within them. Early theorists such as Noam Chomsky were interested in the size of the task of acquiring language, and the similarities in the stages of language development across every language. Another influential nativist is Dan Slobin. He stated that every child is born already having a basic language-making capacity.

The Nativist Theory is discussed very well in this YouTube video:

Constructivist Theorists state that built-in perceptual skills are very important in acquiring language. These build skills guide her attention to specific features of language which she then processes and modifies as and when she receives new information. By doing this, the child develops their own set of rules for both understanding and creating language.

The Eclectic Approach is where theorists draw on all the views of language acquisition, to gain a greater understanding on the environments influences. It is especially important to use both the nativist and cognitive theories. This is as the nativists claim that the ability to process to language is already processed in a child’s brain. This claim is best understood when looked at from a constructivist view of language development.

All these theories are interesting and many have similar ideas, but it is interesting to see the different ideas from different psychologists.

Word Learning

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What are the trends in word learning over the first two years?

Children initially learn words in stages, the first being the pre-linguistic stage. Each singular language, such as English or Italian, has various different dimensions. These are things such as the different uses of language, such as to communicate, the sound patterns each individual language uses and the rules that govern these patterns. These are all known as phonology. Semantics are they ways in which language represents meaning. The rules used to combine words in a language, is the syntax. These terms are all commonly used when describing the development from the early preverbal stage to the stage of linguistic fluency.

This is apparent through observing chimpanzees (Savage-Rumbaugh et al., 1993). They learn to
communicate through sign language and the process of pointing to sequences of symbols. they can do this, and are good at it, but it takes a great deal of effort to teach them to use other expressive forms of language such as symbols signs and sounds that communicate meaning. Any parent will tell you that once you teach a child how to speak, you will never be able to get them to be quiet ever again! This is due to the fact that the process of language development begins months before a baby even utters her/his first word. This period of time within these few months is the prelinguistic phase.

By the time a child reaches around 12 months, they will typically have started using their first word (Fenson et al,. 1994). Within the next six months, children will increase their vocabulary to around 30 words. Early word learning is very slow and requires a lot of repetitions. Ronald Schollon (1976) studied a little girl named Brenda, and found she used a singular specific word for more than one thing. One example of this being the word “nene” for milk, juice AND her bottle.

The Naming Explosion is another trend that happens between 16-24 months of age which children begin to add new words rapidly. Elizabeth Bates and her colleagues found that a rapid vocabulary growth is not restricted to the language of English, it is the same in other languages. After repeating words a few times, it is easier for children to connect them to different situations. However, other cross-linguist researchers suggest that English speaking parents emphasise nouns more than verbs when reading and speaking to children, compared to Korean-speaking parents who do not. This suggests the noun-before-verb learning pattern may be influenced by different language characteristics as well as the behaviour of the speaker.

Later word learning happens during the pre-school years when children begin adding words at much higher speeds, with a rise of up to 10 words a day (Pinker, 1994). Researchers believe this “speeding up” of the vocabulary learning process is due to a shift in the way children approach words that are new to them.

Once a wide vocabulary is developed, children begin to categorise words. Psychologists use the term fast-mapping to refer to this ability. Children begin to categorise after paying attention to words in whole groups.This can be things such as names of different fruit. By identifying what category a word belong to, the child can envisage “mental slots” for these words.Children initially categories things such as animals. However, they can become confused. An example of this may be a child seeing a cat and saying “see kitty”. We are initially unsure on what the child actually means. Is this kitty a kitty, or does she see it as any other furry animal like a dog? She may even use the word to only describe her OWN cat.

This is when under-extension and over-extension become apparent in speech. Under-extension is when a word is used for one specific object in a singular context. This suggests children believe words can only belong to one thing and is mostly common in the early stages of vocabulary development (before naming explosion). Over-extension is when children grasp the idea of categorising words. However, in this case, they do it inappropriately, such as using the word kitty in relation to all animals. (e.g. using a single word for multiple, unrelated categories).

The development of grammar and pragmatics is important when stringing together words into sentences. In the fist instance, putting two words together, then three – and so on. Children firstly begin stringing together two words around the age of 18-24 months. This is not random, it happens when they develop a vocabulary of around 100-200 words (Fenson et al., 1994).

The holophrase stage is when a toddler begins to combine a single word with a gesture, with a result of creating a “two-word meaning”. This happens before they even use two spoken words together in speech. An example of this is when a child says “cookie” and holds out their hand – indicating they would like one given to them.

The Grammar Explosion stage is when sentences become longer. The vocabulary development is fundamental to this, as children who have a more complex understanding of grammar will develop complex vocabulary much easier. As they now understand how to construct sentences at this age, they will, therefore be able to understand new words better and be able to integrate them into their language much easier. During this stage, their speech becomes “telegraphic”, which according to linguists and psychologists is when two-word speech becomes evident in speech. Within the following few months, plurals, past tenses and auxiliary verbs are added into a child’s speech.

The Inflection stage is when the form of a word is changed, usually the end of it. Children begin adding inflections into predictable sequences. Roger Brown (1973) found that in the process of children learning English, inflection is most noticeable hone children add “ing” to the end of words. Once they get the hang of this, they begin doing it in order.

Children develop a full understanding of the development of language once they begin to
understand social skills. It is important, from birth, that a child can communicate their feelings through facial expressions and gestures. These are simplistic forms of communication but are important in the sense that the baby has not learnt any words yet. This process of word learning is a coherent process of integrated stages, without which, we would not understand where a child is in their development of word learning.

I found by completing the reading and this associated tutor-directed task from Patricia Thomsons’s lecture to be very beneficial in reinforcing what she spoke about. It has helped me become more knowledgeable on the range of different theorists and the vast amount of other reading out there that is avaible to us as students to enhance our knowledge. It also helped me make the connections between thought and language, and the ways in which language is developed.

Feedback

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The term “feedback” means helpful information which is used in ways to either praise or criticize your work. It is important in order to motivate you to continue, and in some instances, try harder. It is also useful is instances of criticism to get someone else’s view (through constructive criticism), to help you identify which areas to improve and how to do so.

The feedback I received was very positive and I took it to be a positive experience. It gave me confidence that what I am doing is right, and that others can relate to it and agree with my thoughts. It was carefully constructed and I could tell the person had taken their time to read my post and really think about it, which is great to think. I agree fully with the feedback I was given, I took my time to ensure I covered all areas of the success criteria, so they fact they picked up on this is very beneficial to my confidence. However so far at this moment in time I have not been picked up on any areas for improvement. I am sure there are many, and I can understand it is not a nice experience to criticise your peers and therefore very easy to accidently avoid doing so…

Initially I felt great giving peer feedback as I know it is a great confidence boost to hear positive things about your work. As I went on though, I began to realise that where my feedback will be making people feel good, it isn’t highlighting to them any areas for them to improve. i then began delving deeper into people’s posts to try and word things in the nicest way possible which made the situation much easier. Most people however had such fantastic posts I was literally sitting with what I would compare to writer’s block!

From carrying out this task I have learned that whilst it is important to highlight where people are going well, it is of equal importance to give constructive criticism. I have also learned it is very hard to tell your peers of the criticisms you have picked up on. This will be applicable further into my studies when I begin working closer with my peers. When it comes to reading over their work, I will definitely consider what I have learned from this when giving them pointers!

This is also relevant to the classroom. Children do not want to be bombarded with corrections as it is likely to defeat them and cause them to lose all hope with their learning. As a pupil at primary, my teachers always used “two stars and a wish” on my word. This is an effective strategy of peer feedback which ensures both praise is given and constructive criticism. There are also other methods similar to this that I was unaware of. One which struck me to be very interesting is “plus, minus, and what is next?”, involving a praise, a criticism, and a pointer of what to do to improve further. There are so many strategies for feedback it is amazing the amount of different ways you can give it.

Overall I find feedback a seriously effective strategy. I feel it is important to give praise in order to motivate pupils, but it is also important to give constructive criticism. Without giving someone a pointer of how to improve, what is the point of the initial feedback in the first place? (Obviously apart from the obvious motivational purposes.) Everyone wants to know how to improve in one way or another.

A little more insight into feedback in the classroom…

Other Professionals: 24 Hours in Police Custody

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For the Developing Professional Skills and Abilities unit on Blackboard, I chose to watch 24 Hours in Police Custody. The serious nature of the issues within this programme really highlighted the professionalism required of the police involved.

In relation to the first part of this unit, I found a lot of the words I had associated with professionalism were evident within this police force. In the first instances, the police officers had to be well informed. Before arriving at the house, they had the responsibility to gather information on why they were going to arrest this person, and gather factual background information to give him reasons for his arrest. It is also important they are skilful in their specific job. For example when they are tracking IP address on this programme to find out who has been accessing the child pornography.

The police’s skills were most noticeable when initially interviewing those in custody. It is very clear that they have to use their patience in order to get answers from suspects. Not everyone is willing to tell the truth right away. They also have to be very knowledgeable on different behaviours. It may be clear from the way a person is acting whether they are telling the truth or not. For example, lying can be noticed when people cannot hold eye contact, or use little to none hand gestures when talking.

The police however did not act professional when the man in question takes a break and leaves the interview room with his lawyer. They express their annoyance to the man who is only replying with “no comment”, by slouching right back in their seats and both throwing their arms over their heads – in such way to express defeat. The woman then jokes with the male interviewer about how he is not wearing a t-shirt under his jumper. This is very unprofessional as the interview recording is still rolling, not to mention the fact they could have used these few minutes in a more effective way – such as discussing any suspicious behaviour or their own thoughts on the situation.

Their professional behaviour had a positive effect on the safety of his child. When he is first released, they put into action certain plans; including that he cannot return to stay at his own home, and he is not allowed to see his child unsupervised. By using their professional behaviour to consider the safety of others, they have essentially prevented any further issues that may have arisen.

Their professional behaviour had an initial negative effect on the suspect. By using their developed abilities they were able to find out the sick things he was looking up within his own home. The man, a DOCTOR, would never have expected to have been caught, and as the voiceover on this video says; “someone’s world is about to be turned upside down”. This is only however negative to the suspect as it is not what he wanted – to be caught. But it IS very positive for everyone else; for those around him, and the wider community – especially his patients.

The dress code of our police force is very important. It is an easily recognisable way of identifying the power of those who wear it, which can be helpful if you need help quick in a busy place and do not know who to turn to. It is also stated within the law that a police officer must be in uniform to use certain powers; however they do not have to wear a hat to warrant an arrest which I have always been brought to believe. I think what they wear is important but they should wear what is relevant to the situation they are in. When undercover and trying to obtain information, it is important they are not recognisable as it has been found the well known uniforms cause people to act indifferently. However, when at an event policing it and ensuring it is safe it is extremely important they are identifiable so people know who to go to in order to seek help.

If I was asked to develop a degree to train police, I would use the following training methods:

Lectures. – I would ensure all prospective police officers attend lectures, similar to us as primary teachers, to learn how to act as professionals as well
as developing their professional views.
Background reading. – I would incorporate a list into the programme of essential reading for these officers to read. It would be relevant to their career, helping develop their understanding of what is expected of them as well as making them more well-informed of their role.
Work-based training. – I would send these officers on “work-based training” as part of the degree I’d develop. During this training they would take on the role of the specials – where they shadow fully qualified police officers but do not yet have the same levels of responsibility.

From this activity I have learned that professionalism can be seen in way more aspects of a person’s career (such as the police) than initially thought. In order to be an effective professional, we should develop knowledge on how we should act in all areas of our career, such as when we are not at work but still identifiable – continuing to live up to our professional expectations in our behaviours, attitudes and actions.

I will apply this to my own learning and development by ensuring I live up to my professional expectations ALL of the time. I will continue to participate in further reading in order to widen my knowledge and understandings of teaching. By doing so, I will become a positive role model to those around me, hopefully influencing others to take their professionalism just as seriously.

Practitioner Enquiry

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Practitioner enquiry an important support system for teachers to get them more engaged in supportive research that will aid both their pupils and themselves.

This wheel taken from the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS)’s website was very useful in coming to terms with what practitioner enquiry actually is.

http://www.gtcs.org.uk/professional-update/practitioner-enquiry/what-is-practitioner-enquiry.aspx

Practitioner enquiry involves engaging with teaching from a different approach. It is an investigative approach where practitioners (teachers) have a professional responsibility to further their own personal knowledge through their own research. They can then reflect on what they have found and share it with other professionals. It does not just involve a little bit of research though, it involves having the ability to question findings, strengthening the teachers understanding of professional practice.

There are some main areas of focus within practitioner enquiry. These involve clarifying the teacher’s aims, in order to challenge them for discussion. It is important it becomes a daily occurrence for professionals to aid them with their work and own professional development. It should also be used at all levels within education, not just by classroom teachers.

However, what actually is an enquiring practitioner? An enquiring practitioner is someone who has profound knowledge and understanding of their profession whilst still obtaining the ability to critique it. They should then ensure they use their voice to share it with like-minded professionals. They should be clear on the impact of their findings and be able to evidence it, investigating further any points of interest.

Reflective teachers are important as they have the ability to consider what has happened in their lesson, both what went good and what did not, so they can then come up with solutions to improve their lessons in the future. This allows these lessons to be more concrete with the teacher having clear ideas of what she wants to achieve from them, essentially shaping them to be more effective. These reflective practitioners are the most valuable practitioners, as they can use their reflection to aid them in their profession.

With being an enquiring practitioner, comes the fact we need to work in collaboration with others. By sharing ideas and experiences with those from other areas, we are gaining a wider understanding of those topic areas. This is extremely beneficial to us as teachers to see things from a different perspective. It is also useful as it allows us to gain an insight to where we can gain new sources and what is currently of interest in the education sector.

There are some challenges with practitioner enquiry. Teachers already have a lot of responsibility and it is sometimes hard to constantly do extra work on top of everything. There are also those occasions where those we are collaborating with are not forthcoming and do not appear to be interested. This is very detrimental to a person’s motivation when someone they are working with appears to be disinterested.

As student teachers, we have agreed to be “lifelong” learners. Practitioner enquiry is a great beneficial way of doing so. It means we can develop professional opinions whilst constantly questioning them to ensure we have the best quality of knowledge. As a student teacher I can use this to gain new insights into the latest educational theories. This will then allow me to use them in the near future and within my studies. It will encourage me to keep up to date with our constantly changing education system, and remind me of the importance to continue developing my further knowledge of education.

Values

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Our professional values are our beliefs and principles which guide us in our chosen career as teachers. They are a reflection of what we believe is morally right, such as standards, ethics and practices. These are very similar to our personal values, which also reflect our morals, but are more central to our individual needs.

My personal values played a big part in my decision to come in to teaching. It is important that children are comfortable with their teacher in order to learn and want to come to school every day. I believe my kindness is one of the most important values I have and will be essential to me as a teacher. A kind teacher is someone a child can learn to trust, and hopefully enjoy learning from five days a week. I have been brought up to be a respectful person. These will also be beneficial to me as a teacher, as I know I will find it easy to respect my colleagues and my pupils.

When making my decision on which career I wanted to go into, I knew it had to be something that I would not only enjoy, but I would grow from. In relation to my personal values, teaching is perfect. It will give me the chance to portray my love for the subjects I have a real passion for, and allow me to grow as a person learning more about those I have not done as much. I have very good ethical values, and I believe they will be well applied in teaching. When I think back to both primary and secondary school, the teachers that had the biggest impacts on me were always the ones I found to be kind. I want to be that person, that teacher.

Words Associated With Professionalism

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The Construction of the Professional

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Many different things reflect on the role a teacher plays in the classroom and their role as a professional. I believe these 5 terms in particular are important in doing this:

Integrity

The word itself means to be honest, and to have strong moral principles. Children are not born with integrity, they develop it as they grow up and learn how to behave. As children learn most of their behaviours they will need in later life such as honesty, respect and social responsibility in the classroom, it is important we show them integrity so they too can pick it up and learn how to be moral citizens.

Compassion

To be compassionate, is to show sympathy and concern for others. By showing compassion to our pupils, it shows we care. It shows we are paying attention to them and acknowledging them. By being compassionate we are passing this trait on to out pupils. It is important they too learn to be compassionate to succeed in later life.

Patience

Different children will learn at different paces, and it is important to realise some children will take a lot more time to grasp concepts than others. So whilst we will have to have patience with everyone, some pupils will require even more. It is important as a teacher to have this skill, as learning from someone who is impatient is frustrating as nothing will be broken down and explained slowly enough until understood.

Kindness

Kindness is important in teaching as it reflects on who you are as a person. Children do not want to learn from someone they are scared of. A kind teacher is approachable and their pupils are more likely engage in lessons and ask questions. Kindness is a characteristic of being friendly. Even though we are not in the classroom to be friends with our pupils, it is important they see us as a kind approachable adult they can trust to learn from.

Fairness

Fairness in the classroom is important to ensure all the pupils are treated equally. It would be unfair to only praise one person when everyone else has done that same thing well too. This would cause upset and even de-motivate some pupils. Everyone in this world wants to be treated equally, and by being fair in the classroom you are portraying to your pupils that equality is important and that you should not favour certain people.

Social Media

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•What challenges/opportunities you may be faced with when marrying the personal vs the professional presence on social media?

I do not feel I will be faced with too many challenges, hopefully, as I constantly make sure my social media is acceptable and portrays me in the way I want to be seen.

I know many people who are teachers or work with young people and have deleted everyone under the age of 16 from their social media accounts. I think this is a good example to be setting, especially as your pupils may be mutual friends with these people and you do not want your posts to appear on their feeds.

The General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) states that they acknowledge teachers have private lives, but it is important to think about how this may reflect on your professionalism and fitness to teach. I agree with this, it is important to stay sociable and communicate through websites such as Twitter and Facebook. However, I also feel it is important when becoming a teacher to be more wary about what you are posting and who you associating yourself with online.

My accounts online were already private prior to coming to university, but after the social media inputs I went on to check the privacy settings. It is amazing the loopholes that you can miss, with things such as pictures still being visible to people you are not friends with. I know teachers who have their accounts set so you can only add them if you are a mutual friend, which I feel is a very good idea. This will hopefully stop pupils and parents being able to request you as a friend or contact you.

The GTCS codes highlight the impacts that acting unprofessionally online can cause, with things as serious as criminal convictions. They state that you should not compromise your integrity or personal identity by behaving unprofessionally online. One example of this is a group of primary school teachers who went out to let their hair down, and later published pictures online of their antics. As their accounts were not private everyone could see them, and the daily mail even published an article about them http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1389292/Disgrace-drinking-pole-dancing-primary-school-teachers-published-pictures-Facebook.html. This brings to mind another of the GTCS’ codes that you should think very carefully when writing a post before publishing it. They also state you should never post things when you are angry as you may be caught up in the heat and write something you normally wouldn’t. It is much better to save a draft and come back to it later, you will thank yourself in the long run.

I feel teachers are very vulnerable when it comes to the digital space online and they need to be more careful than others to ensure they are still viewed as a professional. Reading the advice on various sites such as the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, http://www.net-aware.org.uk/# and the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, http://ceop.police.uk/, it has really hit home how unsafe the internet can be.

•How are the challenges/opportunities afforded by social media framed? How will you frame things – positive or deficit viewpoint?

Many of the challenges of social media are framed by a deficit view. You always hear about the negative impacts and the horror stories, never the positive side or the opportunities it can bring.

As a teacher I will frame social media with a positive viewpoint. I think it is important, especially with the development of technology in this, in the 21st century, to stay in the digital space. Everything these days is online, even most libraries now have hundreds of e-books instead of paper copies! And it’s not just books, even CD’s and DVD ROMS are on the way out, with many companies such as Apple not even putting disk drives into their newest models.

Almost everyone these day is on social media. It is a great way to stay in touch with your friends and family, especially those who stay far away, sharing your photos and achievements for them to see. Even most schools now have their own Twitter accounts, which is an excellent way of keeping pupils informed as they are in this space every day.

I will however ensure I teach them of the dangers online, in a way appropriate to their age. Children are vulnerable to a range of different things online, and it is important they know what they are getting themselves in to and how to get out of these risky situations.

Social media can and is a positive thing, but it is important to realise there are very negative consequences.

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