The Need for Social Competence in Academic Success

It was fascinating working with four (4) year old children, during this stage of Initiative vs. Guilt, they involve mostly in interacting with other children at school. This stage provides them with the opportunity to explore their interpersonal skills through initiating activities.

A child's main focus in life has always been being successful in school in order to achieve many riches in adulthood. Many people have supported these children to reach this goal by preparing them for about two decades. In return, their family members expect them that these clueless kids return the favor by going to college. Some have put their immense effort beyond their reach, but unfortunately there is a vast majority of students that do not have what it takes both academically and emotionally to earn a college degree or to even meet their own personal standards. Although they received all the help they could get, their parents forget to even consider that what matters the most for these young adults to go to college is their own willingness

Social interaction plays a fundamental role in the process of cognitive development.. He states: “Every function in the child’s cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first, between people (interpsychological) and then inside the child (intrapsychological).” (Vygotsky, 1978).

Everything the child sees, they imitate. During this time, they learn to walk, talk, learn, and develop their own personality. A critical part of socialization comes from George Herbet Mead’s “Role-Taking and Stages of the Self” theory (Kendall 95-96). The first step is the preparatory stage where children learn to imitate the people around them, usually parents and other family members. The second stage is the play stage where children start to develop language skills and take the role of another person that they look up to. The final stage is the game stage, where children begin to understand who they are, and who other people are as well. In this stage, children learn to play sports and participate in other activities that require them to have an idea of what society expects of them (Kendall 95-96). If a child is denied the ability to go through these stages, they do not receive the proper socialization that they will need to survive in the world. Socialization among children is very important. A child must learn how to walk, talk, eat, use the restroom, read, write, and do many other important skills. Without socialization, these children will not be able to develop intelligence and will not learn how to perform basic daily functions. Children must be taught and know the values, beliefs, and norms of the surrounding culture in order to know what is expected of them

Through play, children are also able to form relationships with their peers, therefore developing socially. They are able to “learn how to work in groups, to share, to negotiate, to resolve conflicts, and to learn self-advocacy skills” all of which are important skills in a child’s world as well as the adult world (Ginsberg 183). This is especially prevalent in young school age children, who have had relatively few social encounters without the presence of their parents before entering school. These young children will often make life time friends by sharing a popular treat at snack time or borrowing a color crayon to another child who has broken theirs.

During this process, children discover how people around them think and these social activities evolve into internal mental activities, also known as internalization. Vygotsky also discussed how children begin

Children are complex, and the way a child develops differs from individual to individual. The study of children is a field that researchers, scientists, theorists and educators have been exploring for decades. CHYS 1F90 studies the foundations of childhood development and allows the students to look at the way children develop through multiple lenses. Many conclusions have been drawn, observing how, when and why children develop the way they do. Jerry and Samantha are both grade one students who are unrelated. Although these two students are both the same age, they are different on a variety of accounts. Jerry is a shy and introverted boy who quickly becomes uncomfortable while talking to adults, teachers and peers, contrariwise

Vygotsky discussed how children learn socially, in a group with others, by using signs and cultural tools (Smidt, 2009). Once children begin to understand the world around them they begin to learn and develop. We can help this, as practitioners, by being their “more knowledgeable others” (Vygotsky, 1978) and furthering their understanding of the world in which they live. In my setting I find we can do this well by listening and responding to their conversations, moving their beliefs along and filling in gaps (Johnston and Nahmad-Williams). Once they have learnt something on a social level, the next step is to complete it individually. Once this has occurred the child has successful learnt something (Vygotsky, 1978) which we can view through planned observations. This is called the Zone of Proximal Development (Vygotsky and Cole 1978) more sensitive interactions can help children further into the next step of their development and understanding. In my setting I see this displayed a lot, by sitting with the children, firstly observing what they are doing and seeing how I can help them get a better understanding of the task. For

Chapter nine was all about the ways in which children outwardly display their cognitive development, the understanding of their environment through their experiences. In fact, by observing children closely in their involvement with dramatic play, use of materials, and the relationships that they form with other adults and children, we can see what we assume are indication of these thought processes developing (Cohen, 142). There are nine processes that we can observe that will help guide us into understanding a child’s cognitive development, which include, forming generalizations, the ability to differentiate, the ability to perceive similarities and differences, the ability to draw analogies, the ability to perceive cause and effect, time orientation, the ability to classify, perceiving patterns, and understanding spatial relationships.

The document, The Inventory of Practice for Promoting Social Emotional Competence, CSEFEL (2013) is a helpful document to evaluate the teacher’s strength and weakness in promoting children the social and emotional competence as educators. The document, CSEFEL (2013), suggest that in order to promote children’s social and emotional competence, the classroom teacher needs to have skills in the qualities, such as building positive relationships with children and family, designing supportive environments in the classroom, social emotional teaching strategies to enhance the children’s self-esteem , and individualized intensive interventions as necessary (CSEFEL, 2013).

No matter how we view life whether it good or bad life is life, and as individuals, our lives are being shaped based on the circumstances we undergo. That is why according to Elder (1998) states on how as individuals we deal with changes in the journey of life, how our families play a huge role towards shaping us, and our history basically determines our present by how our environment has been. Likewise, George (1993) mentions more towards life transitions can be traced to classic perspectives on social roles, the relationships between social location and personal well-being. In addition, these two theories are related because they speak of the same thing just in different view point. Now life course theory has evolved over time because the changes that take place in life makes it difficult to know or to have an idea how our future as an individual will be like. In comparison, during the great depression lives of many people became very difficult to be determined due to the high level of suffering and the challenges people faced.

The cognitive development work currently focuses on how cognition operates in infants and children and how the cognitive abilities arise. Usually these studies occur in controlled lab environments, where the formation of mental representations can be observed when the children confront specific objects and events. Typically research focuses on the analyses of mental processes and looks closely at mental representations (Olson and Dweck, 2008). While cognitive developmentalists have shown some interest in social phenomenon, they often do not look at the social representations. Usually research does not focus on child differences, different mental representation, and the implications for children’s well-being. This perspective could benefit from a social cognitive perspective.

This paper is a report of experiment and observation conducted by this writer Shelly Harryman. The date and time of observation was November 9, 2017, between the hours of 4:00 pm and 5:00 pm. The subject 's name is in the experiment are Deegan Harryman, who is a 6-year-old and Jay Harris, who is is a 10-year-old. The following information will provide a detailed analysis of the what cognitive developmental stage each child is in and why those levels determine the response each child gives. The information in this paper will reflect my personal observation and refer to the text Development Through the Lifespan by Laura Berk 2014.

Vygotsky (1896 – 1934) states that all learning occurs in a cultural context and involves social interactions. The zone of proximal development (ZPD)learn subjects best just beyond their range of existing experience with assistance from the teacher or another peer to bridge the distance from what they know or can do independently and what they can know or do with assistance (Schunk, 1996) “scaffolding” that help students learn in systematic ways. This is illustrated further illustrated in diagram 3. To Piaget there are three element involved in interaction the structured environment, the senses and the brain. Vygotsky added one more element another human being

This essay will examine how social skills and personal attributes help first year university students in the way to academic success. Glogowska, Young and Lockyer (as cited in Richardson, King, Garrett & Wrench, 2012, p.88) noted that many first year students decide to leave university as the consequence of health issue and academic challenges. Concern that academic skills are not enough for students to deal with the problem of transition period and students need more skills and abilities to reach their academic goals.