Explanation on Learning and Teaching in Preschool

 

1.- To explore

Children, from their first years, start developing different ways of discovering and interpreting their environment by testing objects, creating sensory-motor schemes and stablishing contingency; a phase that is recognized as the initial or exploratory moment for them to create learning. Those schemes generated by children allow them to organize, structure and deal with events from their environment and will give them the capability of predicting and regulating situations. Therefore, their implicit learning will be highly connected to their daily context. So that, preschool years imply an inclusion in the physical, social and personal world. This exploratory phase is extremely important to develop social skills such as; autonomy, confidence and self-esteem which will allow them to strengthen their interaction experiences and lead them to construct a positive emotional load and be able to regulate and control insecurity and their creation of ideas.

 

2.- To imagine, think and create

After children create multiple schemes during the first exploratory phase, then they can deal with a new phase in which more abstract and detached knowledge of objects can be developed by using imagination, thinking and creativity. Through imagination, children are able to create unique ideas using complex cognitive tools such as symbolic function. When they combine first schemes with reality introduced in their contexts, the result should be some symbolic schemes that allow them to visualize a hypothetical world on their minds which is a basis of thinking. Therefore, by exploring that created world they would have access to more experiences that lead to knowledge. Thinking is basically the use of mental operations in which the experiences are segmented, analyzed and communicated; provoking the change of schemes and the interpretation of world. Finally, creativity can be seen from multiple ways: fluency, flexibility, originality, redefinition, deepening and elaboration. It also has a sequence of preparation or planning; incubation process, where information is collected and organized; illumination, finding a solution; and verification where it is assessed. 

3.- To entertain while learning

Motivation is a key aspect at the moment of learning as it is the main reason people have to accomplish a goal. There are also some important sources of motivation such as, feeling competent, that involves believing in the own abilities; having autonomy, that implies being able to make own decisions; being in contact with others, which provides confidence, support and affection to create knowledge; and looking for entertainment; they are reasons that lead to intrinsic motivation. Furthermore, there are also two types of goals: mastery and performance goals, which imply own interest or challenge and task-involvement goals that have to do with extrinsic motivation in which a reward is obtained according to the performance. Plus, adults and peers have an important role on maintaining children’s high motivation since the creation of a good environment that provides emotional welfare is determining and fostering persistency by giving adequate interaction is fundamental to deal with difficulties. However, in education contexts is imperative to know how handle rewarding and fostering intrinsic motivation by making decisions about the best way of accomplish the learning purposes.

 

4.- Interaction between teachers and learners

The interaction between teachers and learners has many relations from different areas. Different areas have been identified by Pianta: 1) Attachment model: the children’s mental representation of quality of relationship with parents affect directly how they see teachers. 2) Early experiences of risk of deprivation and its development can define teacher-student’s quality of relationship. 3) developmental periods that include conflict, affection and cognitive stimulus are crucial to define the relationship. 4) the teacher-learner interaction can have some influence on learners’ emotional development and their relationship. It is essential to build bonds between teacher-learner based on emotional proximity in order to get better performances and social competence. Therefore, three teaching environments are needed. Communication and expectations: stablishing what is expected from the beginning and building confidence through communication. Offering help and, advice and instruction: being there when the learner needs support. Promoted emotional help and security: affective interaction and awareness of emotional necessities of children.