• Home
  • Login
  • Registration
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • RSS
ESLarticle.com
Tweet
  • Home
  • Articles
  • Blog
  • Members
  • Add Article

Top Categories

Teaching 509
Other 210
Classroom Management 138
Career Development 135
Learning Methodology 121
Study Skills 90
E-Learning/CALL 87
English Language Learning (ELL) 78
Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) 77
Teaching Methodology 76
English Language Teaching (ELT) 73
English as a Second Language (ESL) 64
Teach in Shanghai
Home / Articles / Teaching Methodology / View Article

Publishing

  • Articles
  • Add Article
  • Articles Archive
  • Latest Articles
  • Popular Articles

Latest Articles

Jan 5, 2019

Metacognition in Reading Competency

As related to the reading process, metacognition can be defined as contemplation concerning one's own thinking processes or knowledge of one's own...

Jan 5, 2019

Mass Media Literacy Reflections for Language Instructions

"You cannot teach a man anything, you can only help him find it within himself." Galileo Galilei Mass media forms thrive today. As development...

Nov 30, 2018

Ideas for the First Class with New Learners

~~The first class with new learners can be an anxious one for all concerned – teacher as well as learners. Below are some tips to make that first...

Nov 19, 2018

10 Amazing Hacks for English Learners

10 Amazing Hacks for English Learners It is estimated that there are over a billion English speakers in the world, including native speakers,...

Nov 15, 2018

Building Reading and Writing Knowledge with Very Young Children at Hom

Education Today, December 2013 Building Reading and Writing Knowledge with Very Young Children at Home  Timothy G. Weih University of Northern...

Popular Articles

1127899 Views

5 Creative Ways to Decorate Your Classroom Bulletin Board This Winter

Back to school, fall leaves, Thanksgiving and Christmas all easily lend themselves to great decorating themes, but what to do when those are over...

366820 Views

Three Unique Ideas To Make Your Bulletin Board More Useful

Bulletin boards have long been existent in campuses. They have proven to be such versatile and useful aids in both the learning and teaching...

133207 Views

History of the Chalkboard

Walk into just about any classroom and you will find one: A dark green board on the wall, lined with pieces of chalk and felt erasers. Chalkboards,...

62950 Views

Report Card Comments

For a small minority, writing report cards isn't a big deal. But most teachers generally dread report card writing time. Completing the comment...

41403 Views

The Most Useful American Business Words

The Most Useful American Business Words: Here's a list that will come in handy for any student enrolled in an English as a Second Language (ESL)...


Educational Approach in Constructivism and Behaviorism

by Fidel Prida

Sep 16, 2017 Teaching Methodology 5667 Views

_notregistered/4c02dd3a23.jpg

Educational practices are incredibly diverse not only around the world, but even within a given school. What some might view as the best approach to educating children, others might see as a mediocre attempt to do so.

The video "Pre-school in Three Different Cultures" illustrates this diversity in educational styles to the viewer. The documentary consists of the filming of three different pre-schools in different countries during the span of a normal day. The summaries of the day's activities given in the video for each of the pre-schools let the viewer analyze both the social and academic aspects of the children's experience throughout the day. The pre-schools included in the video are Komatsudani from Japan, Dong-feng from China, and St.Timothy from the U.S. (Hawaii). The following paper will shed light on what is known as constructivism and behaviorism, and describe which one of the schools falls under each category.

Constructivism is the theory that views children as little individual scientists. When following the theory of constructivism, students are allowed to explore their environment, interact with it, and learn from it. The constructivist teacher acts as a support pillar for students to lean on when they are in need, not the leader that everyone must follow. Constructivism also sees differences amongst the children and the things they learn from their interactions; not everyone learns the same things at the same rate or with the same ease.

After watching the video, the school that seems to have the most constructivist approach is St.Timothy. When it came time for the students to partake on an activity, the teacher gave them the opportunity to choose the activity they preferred instead of assigning them one or making the whole class do the same thing. This approach allows the students to participate on an activity that they find stimulating, which tends to let students learn much more than an activity that they find boring. It is also worth mentioning that when the students chose an activity by pointing at the representative objects the teacher would let the student know that she wanted them to indicate it by using spoken language. The teacher used a constructivist approach when doing this since she did not guide the student on how to form the sentence, but rather let them construct their own sentences and correcting them if necessary.

One of the activities, and the teacher's comment regarding the activity, shows the constructivist ideal beyond any other thing seen in the video. The activity being referred to is the block building activity, during which the students are allowed to rearrange the blocks in any way he choose to. This is a very different approach to the one used in one of the other schools in which students are given specific guidelines to follow when using the blocks. When asked about the difference in approaches, the teacher in St.Timothy responded that she thought their approach was better because when you let children build their own structures they will sometimes come up with things that the teacher would never even think of. This is a great example of the idea that children are like little scientists with very different approaches to learning through their environment.

Another aspect in which St.Timothy's approaches were very constructivists was behavior and discipline. There is an instance during the day during which a student refuses to clean up the materials even after the teacher has asked him to do so directly. Instead of ordering the student to pick up the materials by using her authority like many teachers tend to do, the teacher talks to him at an equal level. She doesn't just boss him into putting the things away, but rather tries to make the student think of the consequences that might come about from not picking up the materials. She explains to the student that if the materials are not picked up some of his fellow students might end up injured. After he refuses to comply once again, the teacher gives him two choices. The student has to choose between spending time alone or picking up the materials. It does not take more than a minute before the student decides to comply.

Some people might dispute that the Japanese approach regarding behavior and discipline at Komatsudani is more constructivists because it has less teacher involvement, but the teacher's approach seems to be more negligence than constructivism. The principal of the school is quoted saying that it is normal and even necessary for boys to fight because it is the way that they learn how to resolve problems that might arise later in life. The statement might have some truth to it, but as his own statement says, the children are learning and therefore don't have the required skills to resolve these problems yet. As a teacher, one can let them try to solve the problem by themselves but always keeping very close surveillance. It is not a good approach to simply ignore the situation or tell a child "why don't you do something about it?", like one of the teachers at Komatsudani was quoted saying when told about another child's misbehavior.

Behaviorism is the theory that states that people can be taught through the use of reward and/or punishment. The theory is also seen as the more repetitive of the two theories because it often involves the use of drill-and-practice as the main form of instruction. In behaviorism the teacher is the main focus of the class and all the students must often follow the directions exactly as they are given.

The school that most resembles the ideals of the behaviorist theory in the video was Dong-feng from China. One of the first examples of this is when the 4:2:1 phenomenon is explained. The 4:2:1 phenomenon occurs due to the attempts of lowering China's population. According to the school officials, the problem is that now more than ever a lot of children are single children that are showered with attention from two parents and four grandparents. Behaviorism is shown when the school staff claims that they must correct the mistakes done by the parents and grandparents regarding the children's behavior due to excessive attention and spoiling.

Another instance in which the school's behaviorist approach was obvious was the bathroom usage. The school's bathroom usage approach was weird to say the least, all students were to go to the bathroom at the same time and in the same place. The teachers claimed that if a student really needed to use the facilities he or she was allowed to go at another time than the one scheduled, but that it was good for students to become familiar with the concept of scheduling and should try their best to become accustomed to the time guidelines.

The school's behaviorist approach was also evident during formal instruction and before meals. Before every meal, the students must always participate in giving thanks for their food by reciting a chant in unison that goes something like "this food sure smells good, I bet it's delicious, I am so thankful for my dad and mom". The repetition of this chant serves as a way to reinforce the idea that the students should be thankful for their parents and whatever their parents were able to give them as a meal.

When it comes to formal instruction their approach is very behaviorist and completely different from the approach taken by St.Timothy. In Dong-feng the students are given specific instructions on how to work with the wooden blocks and must set up the materials in a certain way before they are even allowed to start. Once they start building their wooden structures, they must follow the guidelines, and will not be given any positive reinforcement if they deviate from them by doing something different or creative. Instead of rewarding creativity like the staff in St.Timothy, the staff at Dong-feng seems to only care about the students' ability to follow directions.

When it comes to educating and teaching students with cultural and linguistic diversity, one must always keep the lessons interesting and original. As a future teacher, my area of expertise will most probably be math. My lessons will contain as many visual components as possible and as much student participation as the lesson allows. I will motivate the students to take risks by making a constructivism-behaviorism-constructivism sandwich. The students will be given a task to complete, which they don't yet have the skills for. During this time the students will be encouraged to brainstorm ideas on how the task might be completed; both right and wrong approaches will be celebrated as achievements, the important thing is that they are willing to try new things. Once the brainstorming period is done, I will instruct them on how the task is most commonly completed. The students will then be given some time to practice following the specific steps that allow them to complete the task. After they seem confident enough using these steps, they will be given the freedom to experiment with other approaches that they might have thought of after being taught the steps. They will be encouraged to use any methods that make the task easier for them as long as it gets them to the right answer. They will also be told that it is perfectly fine to use the steps taught by the teacher, but that the approach might not be the only or easiest one.

To conclude, I believe that in education neither constructivism nor behaviorism have all the answers. As a teacher, one must find a midpoint, a way to combine the best aspects of the two in order to provide the best learning environment and results. It is my opinion that St.Timothy was the better school among the three when it came to formal instruction and correcting misbehavior. I also find it worth mentioning that both Komatsudani's staff's lack of action disciplining the students and Dong-feng's bathroom routine were somewhat disconcerting.

 

Article source: http://eslarticle.com/pub/teaching-methodology/139589-Educational-Approach-in-Constructivism-and-Behaviorism.html

  • General Information
Author Info

Author Name: Fidel Prida

About Author:

Copyright © Fidel Prida

Most Recent Articles

  • Oct 6, 2018 Prioritizing Domains of Objectives In Language Instruction Contexts by Fidel Prida
  • Jun 16, 2018 Constructivism in Education by Fidel Prida
  • Dec 8, 2017 Will Integrating Across Content Areas Help English Language Learners? by Fidel Prida
  • Sep 3, 2017 The Counselor's Seat: The Rightful Place of Instructors by Fidel Prida
  • Mar 26, 2017 Laying the Foundation for a Teamwork Perspective with Students by Fidel Prida

Actions

  • Print Page

Articles Archive

  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020

Random Articles

E-Learning/CALL

Progressive Trends in E-Learning

Consequent to the e-learning concepts and programmes gaining popularity with each passing day, the demand for the services to convert Flash...

Classroom Management

Launching Your Teaching Career Part 3 - Rules and Procedures

Are you feeling great about the excellent progress you have made as you prepare for that first, enchanting day with real students in your own...

Learning Methodology

Educational Problem Solving!

A problem is 'a situation that presents an opportunity to make a difference in making things better' and problem solving is the process involved in...

Grammar

Relative Clauses (3) - Other Relative Pronouns

We always use a relative clause beginning with whose + noun, particularly in written English, when we talk about something belonging to or...

Teacher Training

Engage Learners by Integrating Funny Quizzes to Courses

Making good eLearning courses is a developing art. A funny quiz can energize almost any content and produce powerful new understanding for your...

About ESL Article

ESL Article is a private ESL/TEFL site designed and maintained by educators and educational administrators. It was launched in August 2008 with the aim of bringing ESL/TEFL students, parents, teachers and schools information and articles about the teaching profession and learning community.

Icon Group Member

ESL Article is a member of Icon Group Thailand (IGT), a group of ESL TEFL TESOL websites providing educational resources and information to teachers, schools and students around the world. The group was founded in 2003 and now includes 15+ websites covering educational information services, teaching resources and e-learning.

What is ESL?

English as a second language (ESL) is the use or study of English by speakers of different native languages. It is also known as English for speakers of other languages (ESOL), English as an additional language (EAL), and English as a foreign language (EFL).

  • Home
  • Registration
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use
  • Help
  • Partner
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
​

© 2021 ESLarticle.com.
Member of Icon Group Thailand - Educating the Future:
TESall All TESOL  Total ESL  ESL Job Feed
TEFL World  TEFL Jobs Overseas  Teach Overseas
Asia TEFL  ESL Powerpoint  Teacher Training