Educational Theories & Pedagogical Approached To Learning

A poster and presentation assignment for my course at the University of Essex Online.

Introduction

Pedagogical derives from the Greek word, pedagogue, roughly translated to the ‘leader of children.’ As an early childhood educator, we lead by example in the way we act, speak, and behave to motivate and encourage learning.

An effective pedagogical approach helps student relationship with the teacher in the classroom, increasing the level of collaboration and expectation of the learner. It is an insight to the best practice for the classroom.

An example well known and reputable approach is Montessori and Piaget theories for classrooms where kids may work at their own pace and the learning experience is oriented around them. The theories place a strong emphasis on the value of social and cultural dimensions of education, fostering empathy, a love of social justice, and a delight for lifelong learning.

Theories

There are multiple educational theories that can be applied in the classroom. In my discussion, I will be covering the following five theories, outlining how they may or may not shape in my teaching practice at my employed school:

• Behaviorism
• Humanism
• Constructivism
• Cognitivism
• Connectivism

Favorable/Compatible Theories

The two educational theories that have an impact on my teaching practice are behaviorism and constructivism. They have impacted me on two different scales, in the classroom and while designing curriculums.

Behaviorism helps learning through behavior reinforcement, a social skill that is not yet acquired by early childhood learners. An example of this is a child receiving stickers for following instructions such as lining up, likely leading the child to repeat the desired action with beneficial gain (MacBlain, 2018). Illustrated by figure 1, the stimuli is the sticker that created a favorable response which could foster sustainable learning habits, in this case, good conduct.

Constructivism builds on the previous experiences and understandings to connect new ones (Mills, 2007). This is relatable to my school curriculum, building up on previous knowledge gained from the year before by adding new knowledge on the relevant topic. Please refer to figure 2 in the poster for visualization of learning progression.

In my school’s curriculum, units are divided into separate themes, for example unit 1 is on family. The lowest level, pre-nursery, students will learn their basic family members such as father, mother, siblings, and grandparents. In the next year, Kindergarten year 1, their knowledge is built upon units from the previous year, adding other family members such as cousin, aunts and uncles, that can only be understood once they have learnt their basic family members.

Dismissed/Non-Compatible Theories

While researching the other theories and analyzing how they can assist in shaping my pedagogical approach, I came to realize that they are not as applicable in the learning environment and setting of my classroom.

Cognitivism is a learning theory where it is partially compatible with early childhood education. It was a response to behaviorism, which implies learning by how information is received, organized, stored, and retrieved.

The preoperational stage which is the second stage of Piaget’s stages of cognitive development, lays the foundations of language development that were laid out during the previous stage, namely, the sensorimotor stage (Corman & Escalona, 1969). Younger students still struggle with logic and talking view, especially in an environment that promotes bilingualism as the languages they are operating in are not their mother tongue.

The growth of the ability to think and reason comes post early childhood, at the age of 6 and beyond. A study by (Carson et al. 2015) examined cognitive development during early childhood amongst ‘healthy’ children and the relationship with physical activity. It promoted regular physical activity to optimize life-long cognitive health. My school’s curriculum advocates ‘physical play while learning’, that is influenced by cognitivism approaches. Such a practice had proven to be beneficial to students’ education as it increased their motivation for learning (ibid.).

Connectivism combines thoughts, theories, and general information, with technology as a major part of the learning process. With the pandemic that has just passed but still has a big effect in Hong Kong with multiple restrictions, there is clear evidence that demonstrates how technology hinders the development of students in early childhood (Hu, 2021).

Humanism reflects personal experience, centering education around students. As an educator at a school with bilingual setting, and the languages not being their native tongue, the humanistic approach cannot be applied. Teacher needs to be the pioneer of the students, who is the native speaker and expert in the taught language. If the student was to take control of their education, it is limited by their knowledge of the second language being spoken and how they process information, which at the early childhood age would be in their native language.

Conclusion

To summarize, constructivism and behaviorism are selected among the five theories to engineer my professional practice as an early childhood educator. Given the nature of my school’s bilingual setting and my own understanding of early childhood education, other theories such as cognitivism, connectivism and humanism were proven to be less adaptable to early childhood pedagogy as proven by other academics.

Bibliography

Bjorkland, D. F., 2018. A metatheory for cognitive development. Child Development, 89(6), pp. 2288-2302.

Carson, V. et al., 2015. Systemic review of physical activity and cognitive development in early childhood. Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport.

Corman, H. H. & Escalona, S. K., 1969. Stages of sensorimotor development: A replication study. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly of Behavior and Development, 15(4), pp. 351-361.

Hu, X., 2021. Technology integration for young children during COVID-19: Towards future online teaching. British Journal of Educational Technology, 52(4), pp. 1513-1537.

MacBlain, S., 2018. Learning Theories for Early Years Practice. s.l.:Sage Publications.

Mills, J., 2007. Constructivism in Early Childhood Education. Perspectives in Learning, 8(2), pp. 99-105.

Wals, A. E. J., 2017. Sustainability by default: Co-creating care and relationality through early childhood education. International Journal of Early Childhood, pp. 155-164.