What makes educational psychology as a program different from other forms of psychological study is its focus on the mental processes behind learning. I am blessed to be a part of a program where I am taught by some of the leaders in the field of study in topics like motivation, goal setting, learning and the cognitive processes behind each of these constructs. Prior to joining the program, I spent a year as an instructional assistant working with kindergarteners at a local elementary school. With my brief time spent working in schools, coupled with my knowledge of educational psychology, I am especially worried for the success of Black and brown students as our society is in the process of making a number of changes to our education system.
As legislators enact these new policies, we as a community need to have a focus on serving each other as our system shifts, taking away many of the social safety nets for children with the most need. A handful of states are rolling back child labor laws, allowing kids as young as 14 to work. The value of a bachelor’s degree has continued to decrease as college tuition continues to rise, leaving many to wonder if college is the right path for them and many more left without a choice as it is simply too expensive. Also, some lawmakers are pushing for diverting funds for public schools toward charter schools, and though it should be noted charter schools are not by any means bad, the diversion of funds often leave public schools with children with the greatest need without the resources to properly serve them. While work needs to be done to address these legislative changes, in the meantime, here are the things researchers are discussing that need to be addressed for children to learn effectively.
Promote literacy and reading comprehension
Reading is fundamental, and in early education promoting literacy is a major operation that is directly related to success in K-12 across subjects. For young kids this means access to books and being read to by adults, as well as letter recognition, letter sounds and learning to blend sounds to form words. In later grades, students are expected to be able to read age appropriate text but in most cases, students do not properly develop comprehension skills.
When reading with kids, regardless of age, ask questions about characters, plot and predictions for upcoming pages. In older children, recognizing tone, irony and genre in writing help to understand the author’s intent. Also, learning to summarize information as the child understands it is an excellent way to help the child engage a part of memory called retrieval, which is essential to cognitive learning processes. As children practice these skills, their growth will allow them to engage with more challenging material with greater success.
Executive functioning and self-regulation
Executive function and self-regulation are important children’s engagement with their classroom environment and their learning. In psychology, executive functioning includes the processes associated with the prefrontal cortex like attention, inhibitory control, behavior regulation and emotion regulation. Self-regulation and executive functioning are both things that children can practice, and are skill sets children can develop.
Children can be taught how to pay attention to their teachers, giving them suggestions to avert distractions. They can also learn control by having adults provide better options for their behavior or how to deal with their emotions. In young children this may mean learning how to sit in a chair in school and learning how to interact with others, but this process needs to continue as they get older. Children continue to need guidance with how to deal with distractions like phones that disrupt their learning both in school and at home. They need help interacting with peers and learning how to deal with each new social situation that was not a part of the developmental period they were in before. Anyone can do this with the child they care for by providing guidance for getting homework done, helping manage tasks and helping them build skills necessary to functioning as an adult without becoming overwhelmed.
Don’t memorize facts- learn to synthesize and apply
We live in the information age. With iPhones, tablets, and ChatGPT, the days of memorizing facts are gone. Instead, we need kids to be able to take in information, critically examine what’s been presented, and apply their knowledge. Anyone with technology access can answer what and when, but institutions of higher education and beyond are looking for people able to answer how, why, and give educated dissent to opinions or engage in discourse on complex topics.
Employers and institutions of higher learning want people that can synthesize information and apply what they’ve learned to solve problems. Some of these skills are related to the reading comprehension prompt mentioned above but this also has to do with changing how students take in the information they are learning. In order to go from memorizing to utilizing, parents and caregivers can challenge their children about any age how they can use whatever they are learning in school. Does it remind them of anything else they’ve been learning recently? What about a problem in their life or something they’ve heard about on social media or TV? Challenge them to write down their thoughts and ideas in journals so they can return to them and build on them. We don’t want robots that regurgitate things, we want critical thinkers.
Even with the challenges presented with policy change, parents, caregivers, mentors and more can change the lives of the kids in our communities by helping educate our children outside of schools. With these three tips, children can become strong readers, learn self-regulation and think critically about the world they live in. While these skills are essential to education they are also important for life in general. Sharing them with the children you can reach can be a small yet impactful way to build for a better future.
Further Reading
https://fee.org/articles/why-college-degrees-are-losing-their-value/
https://characterlab.org/tips-of-the-week/retrieval-practice/
Photo credit: https://madison365.com/stop-using-black-children-as-an-excuse-to-open-your-schools/