Learning and Child Development

by Hedegaard, Mariane

• ISBN13: 9788772889207
• ISBN10: 8772889209
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-12-01
• Publisher: Aarhus Universitetsforlag

Summary

This volume is based on three years of teaching experiments with a group of primary school students as they progressed from the 3rd to the 5th class (ages 9 to 12). Whereas traditional pedagogical approaches focus on the nature of the subject matter being taught, Hedegaard assumes that any teaching program ought to incorporate children's everyday concepts and motivations. She relates this 'double move' in teaching to situated learning and teaching and subsequently presents principles for putting the approach into practice.A second and more subtle aim of the experiments is to promote developmental learning, rather than mere subject mastery. Special attention is paid to the ways children transform and develop concepts, learn modes of thinking and adopt motivations.While the first half of the book is theoretical, seeking to conceptualise the experiments in a culturo-historical framework, the second half is practical in design. It presents and dissects a teaching example from history, as well as three extended case studies of individual students in orientation, an interdisciplinary subject that embraces biology, geography and history.This study will be a valuable resource for anyone trying to optimise children's learning, including primary teachers, school administrators, child psychologists and parents.Mariane Hedegaard is associate professor in Educational Psychology at the University of Aarhus and president of the International Society for Cultural Research and Activity Theory, ISCRAT.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Aim of the book	11	(2)
Aim of the project	12	(1)
Contextual levels in the analyses of school children's psychic development	13	(7)
The history of mankind - Tool use and practice	13	(1)
Society and culture as conditions for school children's development	14	(2)
Cultural practice in school and personality development	16	(1)
Analyses of development of psychological functions and skills	17	(3)
Children's conceptual thinking and motive development	20	(2)
Teaching activity and analyses of the learning activity of three children	21	(1)
The significance of societal forms of knowledge and thinking for children's concept formation and thinking
The anchoring of knowledge in societal practice	22	(1)
Societal knowledge and personal cognition	23	(1)
Societal forms of knowledge	24	(9)
Empirical knowledge and paradigmatic thinking methods	27	(1)
Narrative knowledge and thinking methods	28	(2)
Theoretical knowledge and thinking methods	30	(3)
The significance of the different kinds of knowledge for school teaching	33	(3)
Children's appropriation of subject-matter knowledge and its transformation into personal cognition and concepts	36	(4)
Pre-school children's appropriation of the preconditions for theoretical knowledge	37	(3)
Subject-matter knowledge and its consequence for personal everyday concept formation and thinking modes	40	(2)
Knowledge forms, everyday cognition and education	42	(2)
Thinking in a socio-cultural and historical perspective
Localisation of thinking: In the mind or in social practice?	44	(2)
Thinking as a socio-cultural practice	46	(7)
Localisation of thinking as a function in a social context	46	(3)
Thinking as interaction within cultural practice traditions	49	(2)
The dialectical relation between forms of cultural practice and personal thinking modes	51	(2)
Content and procedures of thinking - children's learning of thinking modes	53	(3)
Goals, motives, motivation and cognition
The relationship between human needs and motives	56	(2)
Goals and formation of motives	58	(1)
Motive, cognition and formation of personality	59	(4)
Motives, and the child's cognition of motives	61	(2)
Motivation creates motives and motives create motivation	63	(6)
Dominant motives, meaning-giving motives and stimulating motives	63	(2)
Mastery motivation and achievement motivation	65	(1)
How does the teacher create motivation in the classroom?	66	(1)
Motivation contributes to the development of pupils' motives	67	(2)
Learning, development and social practice
School age as a specific stage in child development	69	(1)
Apprenticeship learning and teaching	70	(3)
Learning activity and theoretical thinking	73	(5)
The object of learning	74	(1)
Teaching theoretical knowledge	75	(1)
Learning and development	76	(2)
Combining situated learning and thinking with theoretical learning and thinking-The Double Move' in teaching	78	(2)
The principles for conducting 'The Double Move' in teaching: Exemplified by a teaching experiment in the subject of history
The zone of proximal development as a principle of learning	80	(1)
The teaching design: The educational experiment	81	(1)
Didactics of the teaching experiment	82	(11)
Formulation of problems that involves the central conceptual relations of the subject-matter area	83	(1)
Content analyses and formulation of germ-cell/core models	83	(4)
Analogy to research methodology	87	(2)
Phases in the teaching	89	(2)
Social interaction, communication and cooperation between children	91	(2)
Method
The case study method	93	(1)
Observation of three children	94	(5)
The children in the class and the reasons for selecting the cases	95	(1)
The children's concepts of evolution and the origins of human as revealed through an interview study	96	(3)
Categories of interpretation for the case analyses	99	(2)
Cecilie's learning activity in the fourth grade
Objectives and description categories	101	(1)
Problem formulation phase	102	(3)
Model formulation phase	105	(5)
Model extension phase	110	(5)
Model variation phase	115	(5)
Construction and evaluation phase	120	(3)
Conclusion on Cecilie's development of motives, thinking and concept formation in the fourth grade	123	(3)
Motive formation and cooperation	123	(1)
Thinking and concept formation	124	(2)
Loke's learning activity in the fourth grade
Problem formulation phase	126	(2)
Model formulation phase	128	(3)
Model extension phase	131	(6)
Model variation phase	137	(2)
Construction and evaluation phase	139	(3)
Conclusion on Loke's development of motives, thinking and concept formation in the fourth grade	142	(3)
Motive formation	142	(1)
Thinking and concept formation	142	(3)
Cecilie in the fifth grade - greater independence
Problem formulation phase	145	(6)
Model formulation phase: Model use for the Viking age	151	(5)
Model extension phase for the Middle Ages: Focus on the concept of society	156	(6)
Communicating with other children on the conceptualising of change in society	162	(5)
The numerous activities relating to the evaluation and extension of the model	167	(6)
Using the historical model of society to go beyond the study of history	173	(5)
Conclusion on Cecilie's development of motives, thinking and concept formation in the fifth grade	178	(3)
Motive formation	178	(1)
Thinking and concept formation	179	(2)
Morten's learning activity in the fifth grade
The phases of problem formulation and model use	181	(7)
Model extension phase for the Middle Ages: Focus on the concept of society	188	(4)
Communicating with other children on the conceptualisation of change in society	192	(4)
The numerous activities relating to the evaluation and extension of the model	196	(4)
Using the historical model of society to go beyond the study of history	200	(7)
Conclusion on Morten's development of motives, thinking and concept formation in the fifth grade	207	(3)
Motive formation	207	(1)
Thinking and concept formation	208	(2)
Thinking, the formation of concepts and motives as socio-culturally based facets of personality
The aims of this chapter	210	(1)
Traditions of subject methodology and their influence on children's thinking strategies	211	(7)
Cecilie's, Loke's and Morten's personalisation of certain methods of the subject of history	213	(2)
How subject-related methods become personal thinking strategies and lead to changes in the children's conceptual models	215	(1)
Cecilie's, Loke's and Morten's conceptual understanding and model development	216	(2)
Each child's motives create individuality in his or her development	218	(5)
A comparison of Cecilie's, Lokes and Morten's motive development	219	(4)
Societal and cultural practice as a basis for children's appropriation of personal thinking modes, concepts and motives	223	(2)
Appendix	225	(12)
References	237	(11)
Index	248