Educational Psychology

1. EDUCATIONAL
PSYCHOLOGY

2. Introducing Educational Psychology
• Themes of this Handout
– Learning how to understand learners and
to promote their learning helps teachers
feel more comfortable and successful.
– Students are diverse and some have
special needs
– Theory and research play major roles in
educational psychology and reflective
practice

3. Guiding Questions
• What is educational psychology?
• What primary concerns do beginning
teachers have?
• What is reflective teaching, and how is it
different from technical teaching?
• How can teachers recognize, adapt, and
respond to diverse learners and students
with special needs?
• How do educational psychologists use
theory and research?

4. Goals of Educational Psychology
• Enhance theoretical knowledge of
basic psychological processes
• Improve educational practice

5. Teaching and Learning
Teaching
• A relatively permanent change in behaviour
or knowledge as a result of experience
Learning
• One person’s interpersonal effort to help
others acquire knowledge, develop skill, and
realize their potential

6. What Expert Teachers Know
• Broad and deep subject matter knowledge
• How-to instructional strategies
• Knowledge about learning environments
• Knowledge about educational materials

7. Concerns of Beginning Teachers
• Classroom discipline
• Motivating students
• Special needs
• Assessment and grading

8. Teaching Efficacy
• A teacher’s judgement of, or
confidence in, his or her capacity to
cope with the teaching situation in
ways that bring about desired
outcomes

9. Teaching Efficacy Categories
• Efficacy for classroom management
• Efficacy for student engagement
• Efficacy for instructional strategies

10. Examples of Statements
of Efficacy
• Classroom management: “I can prevent
behaviour problems in the classroom.”
• Student engagement: “I can develop interesting
tasks that students will enjoy.”
• Instructional strategies: “I can teach writing very
well.”

11. Metaphors for Teaching
Provide examples of how teachers might
describe their teaching if they adopted the
metaphor of teacher as: entertainer, coach, lion
tamer, choreographer, party host, circus master,
traffic cop, ship captain, air traffic controller
Benefits of Having Metaphors for Teaching:
• Facilitates reflection
• Serves as a standard for self-evaluation
• Helps initiate desired changes in teaching

12. Two Modes of Teaching
• Technical teaching: Teaching situation is
predictable and calls for routine action
– Classroom experience: Constructive
learning experience
• Reflective teaching: Teaching situation is
surprising and calls for conjectures,
information gathering, and decision-
making.
– Knowledge about teaching and learning:
Constructive learning experience

13. Figure : Similarities in the Day-to-Day
Work of Teachers and Researchers

14. Model for Reflective Teaching:
Reflection, Information gathering, Decision
making, Evaluation (RIDE)

15. Your Turn
• Ms Newby is afraid that she will not be
able to handle students’ misbehaviours
• How might she solve this problem using
the RIDE model?

16. Diverse Learners in Canada
• In Canada, 14% of the 8 million students
enrolled in public schools are visible
minorities
• 12% of these 8 million students have special
needs that interfere with their ability to learn
• Response to diversity
– Equality
– Accommodation

17. Instruction for Canadian Students
with Special Needs
• Individualize instruction dictated by the Education Act
• Rely on direct and explicit instructional practices
outlined in an individual education program (IEP)
required by law
• Meticulously arrange or structure the learning
environment
• Provide external supports, such as calculators, tape-
recorded textbooks, adaptive furniture, special lighting
or acoustics
• Closely monitor students’ progress and provide
systematic feedback
• Teach skill-based strategies, such as how to generate
questions while reading

18. Theory
• What is theory and why is it important?
• Theory is an intellectual framework that
organizes a vast amount of knowledge
about a phenomenon so that educators
can understand and explain better the
nature of that phenomenon

19. Research Methods
• Research methods provide evidence that assists
teachers make appropriate choices in the
classroom
• Types of research methods:
– Descriptive studies
– Correlational studies
– Experimental studies
– Action research

20. Descriptive Studies
• A research method used to describe the
educational situation as it naturally
occurs: what typically happens, how
teachers teach, and how students learn
and develop
• Example research question: “How does
Ms. Newby organize the physical layout
of her classroom?

21. Correlational Studies
• A research method used to measure two
naturally occurring variables and
summarize the nature and magnitude of
their relationship in numerical form
• Example research question: “How is
measured intelligence related to school
achievement?”

22. Experimental Studies
• A research method used to test for a
cause-and-effect relationship between
two variables
• Example research question: “Is reading
program ‘A’ better than reading
program ‘B’ for teaching first graders to
read?”

23. Action Research
• A research method carried out by
teachers in their own classrooms to
inform and refine their personal
theories of teaching and classroom
learning
• Example research question: “Do I ask
boys more questions than I ask girls?”

24. What Kind of Research?
• I want to decide if boys in the Grade 6
benefit more from cooperative learning than
girls
• I want to decide if completion of homework
is associated with better achievement
• I want to examine the number of errors
present in the Grade 8 science book
• I want Maria to tell me about her
experiences in solving a math problem

25. Critical Thinking of Teachers
• Teachers supplement their subjective
ways of knowing with objective, data-
based ways of knowing and go
beneath the surface of their idea