Questions

1. Explain your understanding of Vygotsky's zone of proximal development.

2. Summarise the most important aspects of the learning theories of Erikson, Piaget and Vygotsky for your teaching practice as a foundation phase teacher.

3. Reflect on your newly gained knowledge of learning theories and holistic development and create a mind map in which you outline the most important aspects of holistic development in the foundation phase.

4. Why is it important to have basic knowledge about the musical development of foundation phase learners?

5. Create suggestions for music activities which will support the various developmental areas of foundation phase learners. see (1.3.1-1.3.5). formulate at least three music activities that could support and promote each developmental area.

6. Write a short critique about the implications of knowledge about learning theories such as those Erikson, Piaget and Vygotsky with regards to the way in which you approach activity planning.

Answers

1. My understanding of Vygotsky's zone of proximal development is that learners begin to develop new skills or knowledge through the help or guidance of a more experienced person (teacher) e.g. by using scaffolding which is a method used by either a teacher, parent or peer to help a learner gain new knowledge or skills.

2a.The most important aspect of Erikson's theory for my teaching practice as a foundation phase teacher is to ensure that i motivate and give credit to my learners whenever they do well this will ensure that they get an increase in confidence, self-esteem and they will try to work harder to get more recognition.

b. The most important aspect of Piaget's theory for my teaching practice as a foundation phase teacher is to teach learners to build new knowledge or skills based on their existing skills or prior knowledge, i will also apply the two stages of Piaget's theory which is the Pre-operational stage whereby i teach learners to represent words using images and drawings and the second stage is the Concrete operational stage whereby i teach my learners using real-life examples to enhance their learning abilities.

c. The most important aspect of Vygotsky's theory for my teaching practice as a foundation phase teacher is to first teach my learners according to their different social factors e.g. cultures and their immediate environment and to also apply the zone of proximal development whereby i guide or help my learners to gain new knowledge or skills through scaffolding.3. Through studying study unit 1 i have gained new knowledge of the different learning theories the first knowledge that i have gained is regarding Erikson's Psychchosocial theory whereby i learned that a learner's social factors play a huge role in their learning, the second one is Piaget's cognitive development theory whereby i have learned that learners are able to create or add new knowledge or skills when they are being taught according to their existing skills or prior knowledge and this theory has two stages which are applicable to foundation phase learners which is the Pre-operational stage and the concrete operational stage, the third one is Vygotsky and the zone of proximal development whereby i have learned that the immediate social factors e.g. culture and environment play a role in how a learner responds to learning and i have also gained knowledge that the zone of proximal development is the ability of a learner to gain new skills through the help of a more experienced person. i have also gained new knowledge regarding holistic development refers to the approach of learning that emphasises the importance of physical, emotional and psychological well-being of children, the most important aspects of holistic development include physical, cognitive, emotional, personal and social development.

4. It is important to have basic knowledge about musical development of foundation phase learners because musical development plays a huge role in making learning an enjoyable and easy process for foundation phase learners, music plays a huge role in helping learners to remember the concept taught during a lesson and musical development can be a tool used in order to keep foundation phase learners engaged in learning.

5a. physical development- dancing, playing with instruments and circle activities.

b. Cognitive development- singing songs in various languages and engaging in music activities such as playing with instruments.

c. Social development- singing in groups, ensemble playing and playing together.

d. Personal development- engaging in musical activities, creating their own musical instruments and taking part in different musical activities e.g. dancing.

e. Emotional development- engaging in musical activities with others to get better emotions, taking part in school emotional drama plays and listening to certain types of songs according to how they feel.

6. Having knowledge about the different theories will help me to have a better understanding of the teaching practice through applying the different theories to making teaching a great tool to improve both cognitive and social aspects of my learners.