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Answer to q. 1
C
Answer to q. 2
The term ghost in a biological machine originated with John Watson, founder of the behaviorist perspective. He objected to the structuralist perspective that dominated psychology a century ago and focused on subjective conscious experience. For Watson, the structuralists' mentalism was unscientific because it was observable only to the thinker herself. The student's complaint reflects a humanistic concern that mechanical analogies reduce and dehumanize the richness and creativity of each person. Humanists take a holistic view of psychology, arguing that limiting our consideration to a single aspect of behavior or mental life makes us lose sight of the person's integrated wholeness of our experiences. This viewpoint is commonly held by humanists and others outside of psychology, who object against mechanistic or analytical approaches in scientific psychology. In their own defense, information-processing (IP) theorists would argue that the computer analogy is merely a metaphor that helps us understand how the child thinks and makes decisions. None would argue that the mind is controlled by a computer; yet, the metaphor helps us understand the nature of particular subprocesses that guide thought and action. The holistic approach limits psychology to the study of vague generalities, while the IP perspective allows precise scientific knowledge to be gained about fleeting mental experiences. Further, the indirect test methods pioneered by IP researchers enables the mental processes of infants to be studied and understood, even though the baby is totally unable to describe for others the contents of its thoughts.
Answer to q. 3
American schoolchildren perform significantly more poorly in mathematics than children from East Asian cultures, beginning in the first grade, with the magnitude of the cultural difference increasing with age. In attempting to explain these findings, researchers quickly ruled out the possibility that East Asian students are inherently smarter than Americans; first-graders in the US, Taiwan, and Japan perform equally well on standardized intelligence tests (Stevenson et al., 1985). Yet East Asian first-graders already rely on a more sophisticated mix of basic arithmetic strategies than American first-graders do, including the relatively sophisticated (for first-graders) decomposition and fact-retrieval strategies. And other research reveals that the math-strategy advantage that East Asian children display is already apparent during the preschool period (Geary et al., 1993).
Basic differences in how the Chinese (and Japanese and Korean) versus the English language represents numbers seems to contribute to some of the early differences in arithmetic proficiency. Recall from Chapter 7 that the number words in Chinese for 11, 12, and 13 are translated as ten-one, ten-two, and ten-three, which helps children learn to count sooner than American children, who must use the more idiosyncratic number words of 11, 12, and 13.. The Chinese number-naming system also helps children to understand that the one in 13 has a place value of 10 (rather than one). By contrast, English words for two-digit numbers in the teens are irregular and do not convey the idea of tens and ones.
Several East Asian instructional practices support the rapid learning of math facts and computational procedures involved in multidigit addition and subtraction. East Asian students practice computational procedures more than American students do, and practice of this sort fosters the retrieval of math facts from memory. The type of instruction provided also seems to matter. For example, Asian teachers instructing students how to carry a sum from one column of a multidigit number to the next will say to bring up the sum instead of carrying it. The term bring up (rather than carry) may help children learning multidigit addition to remember that each digit to the left in a multidigit number is a base-10 increment of the cardinal value of that digit.
Differences in mathematical competencies between East Asian and American students seem to be a relatively recent phenomenon that undoubtedly reflects broader cultural differences in educational philosophies and supports for education and the differences in linguistic and instructional supports for mathematics learning that we have discussed here.
Answer to q. 4
First, the preschooler should NOT be beaten for being slow to start to count. Behavioral psychologists assert strongly that punishment has many harmful side effects. Being punished could even extinguish a child's interest in learning. Teaching counting to the preschooler should be made into an interesting game to restore her interest in the subject. To get ideas about making it a game, check TV shows for preschoolers such as Sesame Street. The child could watch the TV show with you; when it's over, then the games could begin. Game activities should be kept brief and varied because it is known that preschoolers have short attention spans. Does the child attend preschool? If so, then meet with the preschool teacher to learn what counting-related activities are done there. Home activities could repeat what is done at preschool and add others as well. While doing the practice with the child, observe carefully the types of errors made by the child while counting, and then adjust the tutoring to fix those deficiencies. This closely adjusted support was recommended highly by Vygotsky, who called it parental scaffolding.. Teach counting skills patiently and in small steps so that no errors, or very few errors, are made. For preschoolers, counting should begin with concrete (real) objects. Don't expect the child to count in her head until object-counting is done well. Have her count objects while riding in the car. Notice the elements of counting, and help her improve in areas of weakness: Does she have the numbers memorized accurately in sequence from zero to 10? Does she count each object exactly once? Does she realize that any objects can be counted, even when they are from different categories? Does she understand that counting gives the same result when counting left to right or right to left, etc.? Is cardinality understood, that the total is the last number reached in the count? Cardinality is the last of the counting principles to be mastered, at about the age of five, so if the preschooler is not yet at that age, then the parent should be patient with her on that principle.
Answer to q. 5
Play is a major activity for grade-school children, especially for preschoolers. Parents can promote their children's development through a careful selection of toys. First, the toys should be age-appropriate; most packaged toys have a recommended age range stated on the packaging. Choose the right level of toy; if it is recommended for an older age, the child might not understand it or experience frustration while playing with it. Either outcome could extinguish the child's interest in the toy. The parent should not hurry the child toward false precocity. Second, the toy should capture the child's spontaneous interest and be really fun to use. If it is fun, then the child will use it often and attentively. If the toy is a boring educational prop, then the child will abandon or avoid it. Third, solitary toys are okay, but if the toy invites social use among friends, it's even better Having others play with it is a way to further the child's interest in the learning activity. The very best toys will be those that permit either solitary or social play. The parent should review the information-processing skills that are common for the child's age, and choose toys that will maximize those skills. For preschoolers, counting numbers is a major interest and skill, so an appropriate toy for a preschool would be one that encourages number counting. Memory toys or memory games are appropriate at various ages for preschoolers or grade-schoolers. Memory-based toys/games introduce strategies to children and let them experiment with various options. Many of the simpler board games for children encourage them to apply memory strategies, and some call for deductive or analogical reasoning. Language learning, such as vocabulary building, is promoted by word games such as Scrabble; rule learning, another information-processing skill, is facilitated by games such as Mastermind. Furthermore, there are computer software versions of many popular games, so children with computers may prefer those versions instead.
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