LANGUAGE ACQUISITION – 201

WEEK 4

What I learnt was educational psychology and approaches to

educational psychology. I learnt behaviorism and Skinner and what
positivists’ aims are. According to positivism, they tried to find the
principles of human learning by investigating the behaviour of animals. It
is concerned with observable behavior. Audiolingual approach is about the
behaviorism. Language is seen a behaviour to be taught. In
audiolingualism, learners are passive and they are not allowed to make
mistakes. I also learnt the cognitive psychology and that it is concerned
with mental process. Using approaches about cognitive psychology, we
can make students’ participants easier in the classroom. I also learnt the
importance of the constructivist movement. According to it, every person
construct his/her way of learning.

What I had difficulty in figuring out was remembering the stages of

Piaget’s theory and understanding the difference between assimilation
and accomodation.

I suppose I need to focus more on how to use these approaches in the

classroom and how I understand the students’ different ways of learning.

I believe I may use this information in my teaching because it helps

me to increase the success of the class. For example If I use the
behaviorism approaches in my teaching, I may shape the human
behaviour by using reinforcement. Also, thanks to constructivism,
students may construct their way of learning and learning may be easier.