KKHSOU Education Assignment (3rd Semester) 2014-15

Education

Assignment (3^rd  Semester) 2014-15

A. Answer the following questions within 50 words. 2×4 =8

Q 1: Define Educational Psychology.

Ans: Educational Psychology is a branch of Psychology in which human behaviour is studied in the field of education. It helps teacher to understand the children’s behaviour, their interest, their potential and intelligence. Educational psychology provides the tools to understand the changes and adaptations which a child needs when he enters into the educational environment and to structure educational systems in order to meet the mental and emotional needs of students.  

Q 2: Mention the factors that affect in the continuity of growth.

Ans: Continuity of growth in early age can be hindered by many factors. Illness is one of them. If a child does not get proper medical attention at early stage of life his growth may be hampered.  Lack of balanced diet i.e, malnutrition and starvation in childhood impedes the normal growth. Environmental factors like disturbances in family, society, insecurity etc. also affects the continuity of growth.  Abnormal conditions in the child like obesity, dwarfism etc. also affects the continuity of growth. 

Q 3: What do you mean by "Learning by imitation"?

Ans: Imitation is the tendency to repeat the observed actions of others. In the beginning, the child learns his movements, actions, and gestures by imitation. In children the capacity of imitating is very much prominent and it is observed that they take delight in imitation. Imitation can either be unconscious, where one imitates the act of others unknowingly or conscious, where habits, gestures and way of talking of somebody else’ is copied intentionally. 

Q 4: How would you like to define personality?

Ans: The word personality originated from the Latin word persona, which referred to a theatrical mask work by performers to project different roles or disguise their identities. It is differently defined by many scholars. According to Kolb personality is a characteristically recurring pattern of behaviour of an individual. According to Munn, “Personality may be defined as the most characteristic integration of an individual’s structure, modes of behaviour, interest, attitude, capacities, abilities, and aptitudes.” 

B. Answer the following questions within 75 words. 3×4=12

Q 1: What do you mean by learning? Show the relation between learning and maturation.

Ans: Learning can be defined in various ways but in educational psychology, it is the activity that increases the potential and willingness of individuals, groups, organizations and communities to acquire and use the gained knowledge and skills. It helps to grow and mature and to adapt successfully to changes and challenges. Learning is the key process in the behaviour of human beings. Maturation is an important factor which influences learning. Maturation facilitates the process of learning. Learning becomes effective when appropriate maturity has been attained. Learning takes place only if the stage for that type of learning has been achieved through a process of maturation.

Q 2: How would you define intelligence? Mention the classifications of intelligence explained by E.L Thorndike.

Ans: Intelligence is defined in a number of ways. By some psychologists it is defined as a general mental ability to learn. By some others it is defined as the power of adaptation or adjustment to his or her environment. According to Wechsler, “Intelligence is the aggregate or global capacity of an individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his environment.” Intelligence includes cognitive abilities like observation, imagination, conception and reasoning.

E.L. Thorndike has classified intelligence into three categories-

(a) Concrete intelligence- ability of an individual to realize actual situations and to react to them effectively.

(b) Abstract intelligence- ability to respond to words, numbers, formulas, diagram and letters etc.

(c) Social intelligence- ability of an individual to react to social situations of his or her daily life.

Q 3: Do you think that proper emotional condition is necessary for memory?

Ans: A proper emotional conditions like being cheerful, energetic, in positive frame of mind, etc. are very necessary for good memory. Proper emotional conditions checks and keep away stress, depression, fear, anger, anxiety, and chronic worrying factors which can take a heavy toll on the brain. In situations where an individual is emotionally charged, i.e. if he is too angry or too afraid of something then he tends to forget a learnt material. For example, if a student is too scared of his teacher, then he may forget an answer to a question that the latter asks him, even if he knows it.

Q 4: What do you mean by retroactive inhibition?

Ans: Retroactive inhibition is a theory that states that people forget not because memories are actually lost from storage but because other information gets in the way of that people want to remember. Retroactive inhibition occurs when many materials are learnt one after another. If there is no gap or very little gap between the learning of the two subjects then the impressions of the material previously learnt fade away.  Materials learnt later destructs retrieval of information learnt earlier so old information overlap with new information. In such case we tend to forget the earlier learnt subject. Then such psychological condition is called retroactive inhibition.

C. Answer the following questions within 150 words. 5×2=10

Q 1: Discuss the importance of educational psychology in teaching-learning process.

Ans: Educational psychology is a scientific and systematic study to know the behaviour of learners. It helps the teacher to study the ability, interests, intelligence, needs and adopt different techniques of teaching for achieving the effectiveness of teaching-learning process. Educational psychology increases the teaching efficiency of the teacher in teaching learning process in different areas as mentioned below:-

Psychology helps the teacher to understand the nature of development of a child in different stages. It also helps to understand the mental health/level of a student as the mental condition influence directly the achievement of students. It should be known to the teachers to regulate teaching - learning process. It also helps to understand the individual difference of students regarding their ability, interests, attitudes & need at different levels of growth and development. It helps in organizing the lesson plans according to the student and their mental level.  It helps to  know the Effective classroom teaching-learning process for transacting the content to the students effectively. It provides the knowledge of different approaches to teach at different age levels. . Knowledge of psychology is helpful in developing curriculum of different levels of students in different subjects. It helps in measuring learning outcomes of the students to judge their improvement and effectiveness of teaching-learning process.

Q 2: Explain the major physical hazards faced by a child during late childhood.

Ans: The major physical hazards of late childhood are as follows -

Illness: The psychological effects of illness in late childhood can make children irritable and demanding. Their school work may suffer and they may lag behind their friends in the learning skills. In this stage, children sometime pretend illness for avoiding regular activities or unpleasant task and to get more attention than usual.

Obesity: Obesity in older children is a physical hazard to their health. Obese children are more prone to serious health issues. Obese children are often sidelined. They also display lack of interest in activities and their playmates often tease them, which make them feel inferior. The psychological stress can hinder academic and social functioning, and persist into adulthood.

Accidents and Physical Disabilities: Accidents experienced or viewed in the late childhood can leave behind psychological scars, which can lead to timidity. This may further lead to reluctance or shyness in other physical activities and may even affect social relationships, school work and personalities. Among older children many physical disabilities reduces the confidence of a child and he tries to avoid social participation.

Awkwardness: Older children due to their awkwardness cannot do what their playmates do or cannot match them in activities or play. As a result, they start to think of themselves as inferior to their playmates.

D. Answer the following questions within 300 words. 10×2=20

Q 1: Explain the Theory of Connectionism with its limitations.

Ans: E.L. Thorndike, a prominent American psychologist introduced a Theory of Connectionisms. According to Thorndike’s Theory, learning is achieved when an individual is able to form bonding or connection between a particular stimulus and a response. As it is based on stimulus response learning it is also known as S.R. theory of learning. According to Thorndike learning is nothing but a matter of bond formation. In his words-"Learning is the establishment of bond between stimulus and response and it follows a mechanical process of blind trial-and-error."

Thorndike's name is famous for his experiments on this theory of learning, where he used animals as subjects. He wanted to prove that like man, animals also learn by this method. In one typical experiment he confined a hungry cat in a close barred room. A plate of fish was placed outside the room. In order to get the food only a simple mechanism is required, that of pulling a string which was tied to the door. The cat tried to escape from the room by erroneous movements. It tried to squeeze through the bars, clawed and bit and rushed around in order to get out of the enclosed room. In its struggle to get out of the room the cat suddenly pulled the string. The door was open, the cat escaped. Next time the cat was put inside the barred room with a plate of fish outside it and with the door tied with a string. But this time the cat committed lesser numbers of errors and snatched at the string at a much lesser time thereby opening the door. This is a typical example of how trial-and-error method of learning takes place. The basic principles of this theory are-

(1)  Bond connection between stimulus and response.

(2)  Stimulus acts as a motive which leads individuals to action.

(3)  Repeated responses for the establishment of bond.

(4)  Gradual elimination of erroneous responses.

(5)  Final response is restored and strengthened.

Thorndike's theory of learning is severely criticized by different schools of psychologists. They said that it was lower form of learning. It does not encourage understanding of the problem, and the creative ability of the learner is ignored. Moreover, the behaviorists claimed that frequency is the most important Principle of learning which helps in all kinds of retention. Some psychologists challenged that the relation between situation and response already exists in an experience which is perceived as a whole.

Q 2: Personality is the result of both heredity and environment. Explain.

Ans: Personality is a set of characteristics or traits that reflect in one’s cognitive, affective and behavioral states. Personality may be based on many factors. Heredity and Environment are also the factors of Personality. Heredity refers to those factors that were determined at conception. Physical stature, facial attractiveness, gender, temperament, muscle composition and reflexes, energy level, and biological rhythms are characteristics that are generally considered to be either completely or substantially influenced by who your parents were, that is, by their biological, physiological, and inherent psychological makeup.

The heredity approach argues that the ultimate explanation of an individual’s personality is the molecular structure of the genes, located in the chromosomes. Heredity involves all those physiological and psychological peculiarities, which a person inherits from his parents. These peculiarities are transmitted to us through genes. It is indisputable that heredity determines the difference of sex and it is on this basis that some scientists contend that heredity determines personality because it is the difference of sex, which determines the personality of men and women. 

Like heredity, environment also has been found to play a very important role in determining the behaviour and personality development of an individual. The environmental influences are those which act upon the organism at the earlier stages of development, i.e., before and also after birth. Environment includes all the extrinsic forces, influences and conditions which affect the life, nature, behaviour, the growth, development and maturation of living organism. Environment has a very significant effect on man. Its effect starts from his birth and continues almost till his death. Among the environmental factors that exert pressures on our personality formation are- the culture in which we are raised, our early conditioning, the norms among our family, friends, and social groups, and other influences that we experience. The environment to which we are exposed plays a substantial role in shaping our personalities. For example, culture establishes the norms, attitudes, and values that are passed along from one generation to the next and create consistencies over time. An ideology that is intensely fostered in one culture may have only moderate influence in another.

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