VIEWS ON HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Read the following scenarios (Slavin, 2009):

• In the first week of school, Mr. Jones tried to teach his first graders how to behave in class. He said, “When I ask a question, I want you to raise your right hand, and I’ll call on you. Can you all raise your right hands as I am doing?” Twenty hands went up. All were left hands.

• Because her students were getting careless about handing in their homework, Ms. Lewis decided to lay down the law to her fourth grade class. “Anyone who does not hand in all his or her homework this week will not be allowed to go on the field trip”. It happened that one girl’s mother became ill and was taken to the hospital that week. As a result of her family’s confusion and concern, the girl failed to hand in one of her homework assignments. Ms. Lewis explained to the class that she would make an exception in this case because of the girl’s mother’s illness, but the class wouldn’t hear of it “Rules are rules”, they said. “She didn’t hand in her homework so she can’t go!”

• Ms. Quintera stated her eighth grade English class one day with an excited announcement: “Class, I wanted to tell you all that we have a poet in our midst. Frank wrote such a wonderful poem that I thought I’d read it to you all”. Ms Quintera read Frank’s poem, which was indeed very good. However she noticed that Frank was turning bright red and looking distinctly uncomfortable. A few of the other students in the class snickered. Later, Ms Quintera asked Frank whether he would like to write another poem for a citywide poetry contest. He said he’d rather not, because he really didn’t think he was that good; and besides, he didn’t have the time.

Please respond to only one task of the following:

(1) Portfolio Task Wk2 OR	Compare and contrast the three scenarios above. Explain which case(s) involved behaviour, cognitive, social, moral, or physical development dilemma. Specify the dilemma. One page
(2) Portfolio Task Wk1	Provide one page to explain and theoretically support either scenario 1 or 2 or 3. Post it to Blackboard discussion board no later than this Friday. You may make comment(s) on other classmates’ portfolio task reports within a week.

VIEWS ON HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Three Scenarios (Slavin, 2009):

Initially, it is obvious that, it would be easy for each one who attended Week 2 Lecture to compare and contrast the three scenarios logically. But then, each one have to exert him/herself to specify the development dilemma in each scenario.

The First Scenario: Mr. Jones’ children are first-graders, so their ages are (6-7). Consequently, they belong to the preoperational stage according to Piaget’s stages of development. In this stage, children begin to represent the world symbolically. One of this stage characteristic is centralization and irreversibility (paying attention to one aspect of the situation only). Hence, children are incapable to reverse thinking. Therefore, Mr. Jones’ children could not recognize that he was raising his right hand because they were facing him. They could not reverse Mr. Jones’ situation to realize that their left hand facing Mr. Jones right hand and vice versa and they imitated his action without paying attention to his command. Accordingly, it is thought that, this case involved cognitive development dilemma. Piaget illustrates that children’s cognitive ability is related to their age and knowledge in this age comes from action.

The Second Scenario: Ms. Lewis’s children are fourth-graders, so they are (9-10) in age. According to Piaget, those children belong to the concrete operational stage. In this stage, children tend to experimenting and they do not believe in abstract things. For Ms. Lewis’ children ‘Rules Are Rules’ and they cannot accept excuses nor encourage tolerance. This stage is called children’s moral development, so they are very attached to implementing rigid rules regardless excuses or tolerances. Consequently, in this case the children have a moral development dilemma, as they are incapable to comprehend tolerance and excuse. As a result, they did not accept the teacher’s tolerance with the girl who did not do her homework because of her mother’s illness.

The Third Scenario: Ms. Quintera’s eighth- grader Frank is about 13-14 years old. It means that according to Piaget, this boy belongs to the formal operational stage. This stage is the last and the most complex stage in the Piagetian stages of cognitive development. In this stage, children tend to think about abstract concepts. They start to think logically and systematically. As Piaget assumes, children’s deductive logical thinking is adequately illustrated at this stage. Therefore, Frank deliberately did not accept his teacher’s approval of his work as a good poet. The teacher’s praise in Frank’s situation had a contradictory outcome as Frank rejected to be praised in front of his classmates. Frank as an early adolescent thought that his teacher treats him as a domesticated animal, the role that many early adolescent refuse. Frank analyzed the situation hypothetically, then, concluded that it was not a good idea to be praised or treated as a young kid.  In this case, it is thought that it involved a social development dilemma that is the refusal of complement in front of others.