A Topical Approach to LIFE-SPAN DEVELOPMENT

1. A Topical Approach toLIFE-SPAN DEVELOPMENT Chapter Sixteen: Schools, Achievement, and Work John W. Santrock

2. Schools • Constructivist and direct instruction approaches • Constructivist approach • Emphasizes child’s active construction of knowledge and understanding; reflection and critical thinking • Teacher provides support for students exploring their world and developing knowledge • Today: opportunities and collaboration stressed • Criticisms: not enough discipline, too relativistic and vague

3. Schools • Constructivist and direct instruction approaches • Direct instruction approach • Structured, teacher-centered/controlled • Criticisms: creates passive learners, few critical thinking challenges • Many recommend: effective teachers use direct and constructivist instruction together

4. Schools • Accountability • State-mandated tests have taken on a more powerful role —No Child Left Behind • Critics argue that they lead to • Single score being used as sole predictor • Teaching to test; use of memorization • Tests don’t measure important skills like creativity and social skills

5. Schools • Schools and developmental status • Early childhood education • The norm in many states, private and publicly funded • Many ways young children are educated • The child-centered kindergarten • Emphasizes the whole child • Physical, cognitive, socioemotional development • Needs, interests, and learning style • Emphasizes learning process

6. Schools • Schools and developmental status • Montessori approach • Originally developed for MR children, then for poor • Teacher is facilitator • Children encouraged to be early decision makers • Fosters independence and cognitive development skills • De-emphasizes verbal interactions • Criticisms vary

7. Schools • Developmentally Appropriate and Inappropriate Education • Developmentally appropriate practice • focuses on age/individual (uniqueness) appropriateness • Recently: more focus on sociocultural factors • Developmentally inappropriate practice • direct instruction, extensive use of drill/practice, relies on paper-and-pencil activities given to large groups • Children show slower development

8. Schools • Education for disadvantaged children • 1965 – Project Head Start • U.S. programs vary for low-income children • Proven positive and quality experiences • Not all U.S. programs created equal in quality • Most successful: well-designed and well-implemented • Controversies in early childhood education • Include both academic and constructivist approaches

9. Schools • Elementary education • Change from “home-child’’ to “school-child” • New roles and obligations • Too often, early schooling has more negative feedback; lowers child’s self-esteem • Teachers often pressured to cover curriculum; • Tight scheduling; may harm children

10. Schools • Educating adolescents • Transition to Middle or Junior High School • Independent from parent monitoring; more choices • Physical and bodily image changes, cognitive changes • Impersonal structure, multiple teachers, stressful times • “Top dog phenomenon” • Benefits • More opportunities, friends, challenges, feel grown up • More subject choices, intellectual work challenges

11. Schools • Effective schools for young adolescents • Fears: junior highs being “watered-down” high schools, mimicked curriculum, schedules • There are biological, psychological differences • Carnegie report: • U.S. middle schools: massive, impersonal, and lacking • Recommended complete overhaul and changes: more flexible curriculum, more fitness-health programs

12. Schools • Effective schools for young adolescents • High School • Concerns about education and students • Needs pathway to student identity achievement • Graduate with inadequate skills • Enter college needing remediation classes • Student drop out rates decreasing today • Ethnic and racial differences • Gender differences

13. Schools • Effective schools for young adolescents • Effective programs that discourage high school dropping out include • Bill and Melinda Gates foundation funding • “I Have A Dream” program • Projects adopt entire public grade level or cohorts in housing projects; gives college tuition to high school grads • Reading, tutoring, counseling, mentoring programs

14. Schools • College and Adult Education • Transition to College • Replays the top-dog phenomenon • Many of same benefits found in high school • Movement to a larger, more impersonal school • Interact with peers of more diverse backgrounds • Increased focus on achievement and assessment • More opportunities to explore lifestyles and values • Many experience more stress and depression

15. Schools • College and Adult Education • Adult education includes • Literacy training, community development • University credit programs, on-the-job training • Continuing professional education • Women — the majority of adult learners • Occurs in many forms, offered by many sources • Individual reasons for attending adult ed/college vary

16. Schools • Educating children with disabilities • Approximately 13.5% (ages 3 to 21) in United States receive special education or related services • Learning disability: • Difficulty learning/understanding/doing math • Gender differences: “Referral bias”? • Boys are 3x more diagnosed as girls • Diagnosis difficult; guidelines vary among states

17. Schools • Educating children with disabilities • Dyslexia: • Severe impairment in ability to read and spell • Brain scans used; difficulty integrating information • Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) • Inattention, hyperactivity, impulsivity; onset in childhood • Definitive causes unknown; in DSM-IV • Medication is common treatment; other treatments vary • Stricter behavioral school rules “illuminate” these

18. Schools • Educating children with disabilities • Autism spectrum disorders • Autistic disorder: severe; onset in first three years • Asperger syndrome: mild impairments: obsessiveness • No proof of being caused by family socialization • Affects about 1 million children today

19. Schools • Educating children with disabilities • Public Law 94-142, Education for All Handicapped Children Act; renamed as IDEA in 2004 • Individualized education plan (IEP) — written program tailored to child with disability • Least restrictive environment (LRE) — child with disability educated in setting similar to where other children educated • Inclusion — educating child with special education needs in regular classroom

20. Schools • Socioeconomicstatus and ethnicity • Low-income, ethnic minority children face more difficulties in school • Schools in poor areas • Underfunded, low test scores and graduation rates • Young inexperienced teachers, largely segregated • Rote learning promoted • More minorities put in remedial/special education classes, suspended from school • Asians and Whites more likely put in advanced classes

21. Schools • SES and ethnicity • Improving relationships among ethnically diverse • Turn class into jigsaw classroom • Positive personal contact with diverse other students • Engage in perspective taking; reduce bias • View school and community as a team • Comprehensive school plan, assessment strategy, and staff development plan • Mental health/support team • Parents’ program

22. Achievement • Extrinsic and intrinsic motivation • Extrinsic • Activity is means to an end • Often motivated by rewards and punishment • Intrinsic • Activity is an end in itself • Self-determination and personal choices • Personal responsibility for behavior encouraged

23. Achievement • Extrinsic and intrinsic motivation • Developmental shifts • Intrinsic motivation increases with age for most • Decreases in early high school • Greatest extrinsic increase and intrinsic decrease between sixth and seventh grade • Blamed on impersonalization experiences, increased evaluations (standardized tests) and competition

24. Achievement • Extrinsic and intrinsic motivation • Conclusions • Create stimulating cognitive environments • Promote more self-responsibility for student learning • Some rewards can undermine learning; rewards most effective with high interest • Rewards convey mastery information

25. Achievement • Mastery motivation and mindset • Mastery Motivation • Mastery orientation— task-oriented; concerned with learning strategies • Helpless orientation— one seems trapped by difficulty and attributes one’s difficulty to a lack of ability • Performance orientation— achievement outcomes; winning matters

26. Achievement • Mastery motivation and mindset • Mindset • Cognitive view of oneself • Fixed mindset: “carved in stone” • Growth mindset: belief in change • Promotes optimistic or pessimistic outlook • Shaping begins due to interactions with others • Growth mindset shows higher achievement results • Self-Efficacy • Belief that one can master a situation/have good results

27. Achievement • Goal-Setting, planning, and self-monitoring • Self-efficacy and achievement improve when individuals set goals that are • Specific • Proximal (short-term) • Challenging • Can set both long and short-term goals • Expectations linked to outcomes/efforts • Setting highest standards that can be achieved is best

28. Achievement • Goal-Setting, planning, and self-monitoring • Purpose • Accomplish something meaningful to one’s self; contribute something to the world beyond one’s self • Teachers, parents convey importance of goals; should discuss where goals lead to (long-term picture) • Negative influences • Some TV/media, violent models of aggression/video games, unrealistic views of the world, passive learning, stereotyping, and other distractions

29. Achievement • Goal-Setting, planning, and self-monitoring • Purpose • Technology concerns for children, emerging adults • Computer and Internet • Online social environments (MySpace, Facebook) • Proper use, restrictions can be beneficial • Internet and aging adults • Fastest growing population of users • Search for information, use for fast communication

30. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • Aging and culture • Good life based on health, security, kinship network • Collectivistic cultures (e.g. China, Japan) have high respect for older persons than individualistic cultures like United States • Possess valuable knowledge, control key family resources, remain “useful,” aging role changes have greater capacity, integrated extended family, role continuity throughout life span

31. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • Socioeconomic status (SES) • Grouping by occupational, educational, and economic similarities • SES differences are proxy for material, human, and social capital within and beyond the family • SES variations in neighborhoods • Affect children’s adjustment: disadvantages/advantages • Crime and isolation linked to low self-esteem, distress

32. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • SES differences • Lower-SES parents • More concerns with child conformity to society, home of strong parental authority, corporal punishment use and more directive than interactive communication • Higher-SES parents • Concerned with delayed gratification, discipline rules discussed with children, less physical punishment, more interactive conversation

33. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • Poverty • Challenges of poverty have impact on adult lives • 2006: 17% of children under age 18 in poverty • U.S. poverty level demarcated by family structure and ethnic lines; minorities overrepresented • Psychological impact • Powerless, less financial resources, alternatives are restricted; environmental inequities is damaging

34. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • Families and poverty • Links between economic well-being, parental behavior, and social adjustment • Feminization of poverty • Programs that have made an positive impact • Minnesota Family Investment Program (MFIP) • New Hope Program

35. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • SES, poverty, and aging • Older adults in poverty linked to increased physical and mental health problems • Poverty among older minorities 2 to 3 times higher • Retirement forces reduced income and spending • Expenses, cost-of-living increases • Social security for those over 65 years

36. Achievement • Ethnicity • United States is more ethnically diverse than ever before • Immigration • High rates impact on ethnic population growth • Special stressors for immigrants (language, changed SES, support system separation, struggle to adapt but preserve ethnic identity) • Acculturation: parents and children often at different stages of the process

37. Achievement • Ethnicity and SES • Research unclear due to methods used • Ethnicity and families • Ethnic group variations in size, structure, composition, kinship network, levels of education and income • Highest risks of poverty • Single or uneducated parents • All parents face childrearing challenges • Greatest harm to children

38. Achievement • Ethnicity and culture • Differences and diversity • Historical, economic, and social experiences produce differences between minority groups • Stereotyping of perceived deficits are harmful • Great diversity between groups seen as “one” • Latinos: experiences of Cubans and Puerto Ricans • Asians: Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, Thai • Ethnicity and aging • Face problems of racism, ageism, and sexism for women

39. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Career Developmental Changes • Young children • Idealistic fantasies about what to be when they grow up • High school • Serious career decisions as different options explored • College • Choose major/specialization leading to work in a field • Early adulthood • Start full-time occupation

40. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Career Development • Match personality type to career • Realistic: prefer solitude, being outdoors • Investigative: interested in ideas, intellectualist • Artistic: creative, innovative ways for self-expression • Social: helping orientation, desire to be with people • Enterprising: dominating, good at persuasion • Conventional: detail-oriented, prefer highly structured situations

41. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Career Development • Important aspect of choosing a career — match career to one’s values • Monitoring the Occupational Outlook • Labor force participation of women increasing • Work in Adolescence • 90% receive high school diplomas • 75% work part-time and attend school

42. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Work in Adolescence • U.S. high school students • 75% work part-time and attend school • Most work 16-20 hours per week • Most work in service jobs • Work more than in other developed countries; less than developing countries

43. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Work • Emerging adulthood • Many variations of work patterns exist in merging roles of student and worker • Co-op programs, some dropouts, most graduate • Transition strongly influenced by level of education • Special concern: many attending community colleges but drop out or don’t finish

44. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Work • Adulthood • The work landscape • National survey: 55% less productive due to stress; 52% considered or made a career change because of stress in the workplace • Unemployment • Dual-career couples • Males assuming more home responsibilities • Women assuming more ‘breadwinner’ roles

45. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Work • Middle Adulthood • Midlife time of evaluation, assessment, and reflection • Recognizing limitations in career progress • Deciding whether to change jobs or careers • Rebalance family and work • Planning for retirement

46. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Work • Late Adulthood • Percentage of older adults who work part-time steadily increased since 1960s • Good health • Strong psychological commitment to work • Distaste for retirement • Cognitive ability is best predictor • Many participate in unpaid work • Age affects many aspects of work

47. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Retirement • Option to retire late twentieth-century phenomenon in United States • Today’s workers will spend 10 to 15% of their lives in retirement • Flexibility is key factor in adjustment

48. Careers, Work, and Retirement • Retirement • Many return to work after retirement — about 7 million in 2006 • Adjustment to retirement varies according to life changes and circumstances • Retirement planning includes more than successful financial planning

49. The End