Positive and Negative Reinforcement in Operant Conditioning:

Operant Conditioning was first introduced by B.F. Skinner as a part of his study of Behaviorism. It is the idea that behavior can be increased or decreased by providing reinforcements and punishments. He is known for creating the Skinner Box where he used punishment and reinforcement to teach mice how to get food. Reinforcement is when a stimulus is either added or taken away in order to increase a wanted behavior. When a stimulus is added, it is positive; when a stimulus is taken away, it is negative. It is important to remember that not all reinforcements will work for every student. Everyone is different and motivated by different things and that must be taken into consideration.

In the classroom:

One way to use positive reinforcement would be to give students a ticket whenever they demonstrated a wanted behavior, such as raising their hand to answer a question instead of shouting out. They could then exchange their tickets for tangible prizes such as candy or a sticker, or an intangible prize such as getting to have free time or sit in a special seat for class. This would be a form of a token economy. A way to use negative reinforcement would be to take away a stimulus as a reward for wanted behavior. For example, if students participate actively in the class discussion (the wanted behavior), the accompanying quiz will be taken away. 

Fixed Reinforcement Schedule (ratio and interval):

A fixed reinforcement schedule is one type of intermittent schedule of reinforcement. Intermittent schedules are ones where the reinforcement is only given after some occurrences of encouraged behavior, instead of after every occurrence. “Fixed” means that there is more regularity in the reinforcements. A fixed ratio schedule means that there is a specific number of behaviors before you reinforce the behavior. A fixed interval schedule means that there is a specific amount of time in between each reinforcement. 

In the classroom:

An example of how to use a fixed ratio schedule would be to reward every 5th student who transitions well from one activity to the next. This would be beneficial in a situation where the class as a whole is struggling with transitions. One way to use a fixed interval schedule would be working with one student who particularly struggles with staying on task. You could set a timer for 10 minute intervals throughout the day and every time that the timer goes off, you check to see if the student is on task. If they are, they get a reward. If they are not, they do not get the reward.

Short-term, Working, and Long-term Memory:

There are three types of memory that all serve different purposes for children and adults. First, there is short-term memory. Short-term memory is only capable of holding a small amount of information for a short time. Working memory also holds a small amount of information but adds the ability to process and manipulate the information while you have it temporarily. For both short-term and working memory, adults can hold information for about 30 seconds (it is less for children) and hold around seven bits of information. Long-term memory holds lots of information for longer periods of time. It is able to be accessed later for you to recall information. It is known to have limitless storage.

In the classroom:

In an elementary school classroom, the goal most of the time is to help students store new information learned in their long-term memory. Then they will be able to retrieve this new knowledge in future situations and apply it to real world situations. One way that you can increase information being stored in your students’ long-term memories is to teach metacognitive skills. This is helping students to actively monitor their learning and think about their thinking. Pausing and having students reflect on what they have just learned and identifying whether they think that they have comprehended it is a good place to start. Get students in the habit of thinking about whether they are engaged and taking in new knowledge.

Brain Development:

Brain development plays a big part in learning. There are lots of different parts of the brain that are responsible for different skills. There are different lobes - frontal, parietal, temporal, and occipital which make up the forebrain region. There is also the hindbrain, which includes the cerebellum and spinal cord and is responsible for the automatic reflexes (fight, flight, food, fornication). The midbrain is responsible for sensory processes.

In the classroom:

One thing to keep in mind when you are thinking about brain development-based learning is that, similar to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, if a students' basic needs are not met or they feel unsafe or stressed in the classroom, they will use their hindbrain and respond reflexively to what is going on instead of their forebrain, which is responsible for higher level cognition/reasoning. For example, if a student answers a question incorrectly and then feels called out and put on the spot by the teacher or another student, it will be difficult for them to hear the correction and apply it. The teacher may need to wait for a different time and allow the student to calm down first.

Piaget's Assimilation and Accommodation:

Piaget was a constructivist who believed that development goes before learning. He stated that as children learned, they adapted their thinking to adjust to the environment. There are two ways that this occurs. One is assimilation. This occurs when children fit a new experience into a schema that they already have. Another is accommodation. This is when children change a schema they already have to fit a new experience. 

In the classroom:

Assimilation may occur when new information gets added to an idea that students already had. For example, when students are learning letter sounds, they already know that each letter makes a sound. So when they learn that the letter z says /z/, they can fit this new knowledge into the previous information that they have learned about other letters and their sounds. Accommodation may occur when a student thinks they know something and then it gets corrected. For example, they may think that the sun moves because they can observe it seemingly going up and down throughout the day. When a teacher teaches them that actually the Earth is moving around the sun, students must accommodate this new information. They need to change what they believe to fit the new learning.

Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development:

Vygotsky was a social constructivist who believed that learning goes before development. An important aspect of his theory is that children learn through discussion and conversation with more advanced people. Vygotsky understood that there is a difference between what a child can do on their own and what they can do with an older, more experienced individual. The zone of proximal development is in this difference/gap and it is where the most learning can occur and is most beneficial.

In the classroom:

When assigning students work, you want to make sure that the work is at the perfect difficulty level where it is not too easy that no learning is taking place, and not too difficult that it becomes frustrating. A good way to make sure you are teaching in the zone of proximal development is to make sure to pre-assess students so that you know their independent level, or what they can do on their own, like reading a level B reading level book. Then you work with the students individually or in small groups with a book slightly above their reading level, like a C or D. Once students have gained skills and confidence at the higher level and are able to now read those independently, move on to the next level.

Modeling:

Modeling is a part of the social cognitive theory which states that people learn through observing and watching others model a behavior and observing the consequences that the models receive based on their actions.