Lecture Week 1
Conceptual development
- Understanding of objects and events in our environment (properties, associations,
causes, effects)
- First: ability to distinguish between physical concepts (teddy bear vs baby bottle)
- Later: ability to understand abstract concepts (time, order, numbers)
Categorisations: levels of inclusiveness and how to measure them
- Put them in the same pile
- Call them by the same name
- Respond to them in the same way
Form of inductive reasoning
Three levels of inclusiveness:
Superordinate - animal
Basic - dog
Subordinate - chihuahua
Our brains can handle large amounts of information by summarizing input → create mental
representation
Tasks we need to know:
Looking tasks
- habituation
- non-verbal looking preference (3-4 months old)
- infants look longer at a new animal (categorisation based on perception)
Sequential touching tasks
Sorting and matching to sample tasks
Development of categorization
Characteristic features: Grandmothers are old (preferred by 5 year olds)
Defining features: your grandmother is the mother of your parent (preferred by 9 year olds)
- underlying shift from concrete to abstract
- perceptual → contextual
- general → specific
- intuitive → factual
Why is reasoning important?
Learning how the world works
- theory of mind
Making predictions about the future and adapting
Essential for school learning
Learning by playing: toys, science projects in school, ‘’if i do x, then y will happen’’
, Types of reasoning
- inductive: specific → general
- rex is a dog, rex is aggressive, all dogs are aggressive
- deductive: general → specific
- all dogs are mammals, rex is a dog, rex is a mammal
Can children reason with analogies?
Generally, even children of 3 years old already do this well
Lecture 2 Development of Reading and Math
Phonological Awareness
- understanding the structure of words
- key for learning to read
- understanding and manipulating the component sounds of words
becoming aware of: sentences, words, syllables, phonemes
tasks:
- tapping task (tap for number of syllables; school psychology= 5 taps)
- develops before reading instruction
- counting task (lay down number of counters that equals number of syllables)
- telraam
- 5 year olds are already able to perform well on this task
- develops before reading instruction
- deletion task (say just a part of the word)
Onset and rime awareness
- more complex
- tasks: do these words rhyme; hat-cat?
- Oddity task: odd word out (4-5 years old)
- top, doll, hop (final sound) 71% correct
- bus, bun, rug (onset sound) 56% correct
Phoneme awareness: being able to divide spoken words into the smallest sound elements
- example: boot (b) (oo) (t)
- most complex
- develops after direct teaching
- not a natural speech unit: only becomes important after starting reading
Different across languages
English example: ‘’ough’’ are different in cough, dough, thought, through etc
Phonemic structures
- Spanish/ Italian; consonant-vowel
- example ma-ma, ca-sa
- easier to learn
- English/German; consonant-vowel-consonant
Conceptual development
- Understanding of objects and events in our environment (properties, associations,
causes, effects)
- First: ability to distinguish between physical concepts (teddy bear vs baby bottle)
- Later: ability to understand abstract concepts (time, order, numbers)
Categorisations: levels of inclusiveness and how to measure them
- Put them in the same pile
- Call them by the same name
- Respond to them in the same way
Form of inductive reasoning
Three levels of inclusiveness:
Superordinate - animal
Basic - dog
Subordinate - chihuahua
Our brains can handle large amounts of information by summarizing input → create mental
representation
Tasks we need to know:
Looking tasks
- habituation
- non-verbal looking preference (3-4 months old)
- infants look longer at a new animal (categorisation based on perception)
Sequential touching tasks
Sorting and matching to sample tasks
Development of categorization
Characteristic features: Grandmothers are old (preferred by 5 year olds)
Defining features: your grandmother is the mother of your parent (preferred by 9 year olds)
- underlying shift from concrete to abstract
- perceptual → contextual
- general → specific
- intuitive → factual
Why is reasoning important?
Learning how the world works
- theory of mind
Making predictions about the future and adapting
Essential for school learning
Learning by playing: toys, science projects in school, ‘’if i do x, then y will happen’’
, Types of reasoning
- inductive: specific → general
- rex is a dog, rex is aggressive, all dogs are aggressive
- deductive: general → specific
- all dogs are mammals, rex is a dog, rex is a mammal
Can children reason with analogies?
Generally, even children of 3 years old already do this well
Lecture 2 Development of Reading and Math
Phonological Awareness
- understanding the structure of words
- key for learning to read
- understanding and manipulating the component sounds of words
becoming aware of: sentences, words, syllables, phonemes
tasks:
- tapping task (tap for number of syllables; school psychology= 5 taps)
- develops before reading instruction
- counting task (lay down number of counters that equals number of syllables)
- telraam
- 5 year olds are already able to perform well on this task
- develops before reading instruction
- deletion task (say just a part of the word)
Onset and rime awareness
- more complex
- tasks: do these words rhyme; hat-cat?
- Oddity task: odd word out (4-5 years old)
- top, doll, hop (final sound) 71% correct
- bus, bun, rug (onset sound) 56% correct
Phoneme awareness: being able to divide spoken words into the smallest sound elements
- example: boot (b) (oo) (t)
- most complex
- develops after direct teaching
- not a natural speech unit: only becomes important after starting reading
Different across languages
English example: ‘’ough’’ are different in cough, dough, thought, through etc
Phonemic structures
- Spanish/ Italian; consonant-vowel
- example ma-ma, ca-sa
- easier to learn
- English/German; consonant-vowel-consonant
