1. Advanced Developmental Psychology
PSY 620P

2. Socialization Processes
Parent-child relationships
Peer relationships
School and community influences
Children and adolescents spend more time in school than any other place outside home
Research typically conducted by educational psychologists and sociologists
Schools can promote competence or reinforce developmental difficulties

3. School as a multilevel context
Classroom Practices
Curriculum Content
Instructional Design
School
Curriculum Policies
Demographics
Organization
Child
Classroom Engagement
Motivation
Self-Esteem
Achievement
Goals
External Relations
School, home,
community linkages
Hierarchical & interdependent levels of organization; further levels include district, state, nation; levels vary from proximal to distal
Effects on child are both direct and indirect; direct effect of cooperative learning practices/school policy on child’s self-esteem and achievement
Example of indirect: standardized testing (FCAT) changes instructional focus to drill and practice; which may be at odds with teacher’s own goals/beliefs; affects teacher’s motivation and then affects child’s performance and development
Dynamic interactions between levels
Processes change across children’s development—idea of goodness of fit with child’s stage (=developmentally appropriate practice)
Processes change at different school levels (e.g., declines in student well-being at transition to middle school)
Teacher Characteristics
Beliefs
Instruction Techniques
Relationships with
students

4. direct and indirect effects
Hypothesized case: Heterogeneous grouping and complex instruction  increase educational equity
direct and indirect effects
on child…

5. At Success Academy Charter Schools, High Scores & Polarizing Tactics
At Success Academy Charter Schools, High Scores & Polarizing Tactics. KATE TAYLOR. APRIL 6, 2015, NYT
At most schools, if a child is flailing academically, it is treated as a private matter. But at Success Academy Harlem 4, one boy’s struggles were there for all to see: On two colored charts in the hallway, where the students’ performance on weekly spelling and math quizzes was tracked, his name was at the bottom, in a red zone denoting that he was below grade level.

6. Plusses and minuses….
Though it serves primarily poor, mostly black and Hispanic students, Success is a testing dynamo, outscoring schools in many wealthy suburbs, let alone their urban counterparts.
In New York City last year, 29 percent of public school students passed the state reading tests, and 35 percent passed the math tests.
At Success schools, the corresponding percentages were 64 and 94 percent.
Charter schools are publicly funded but privately operated.

7. Level 1: Academic Tasks and Instruction
Curriculum Content
Work must be relevant to optimally engage students
Historical reality of all students
Developmental interests
Design of Instruction
Materials and activities allowing for scaffolded learning
Appropriately challenging
Integration of many cognitive operations
Multiple modes of representing a problem
Successive but integrated lessons
Appropriately challenging – zone of proximal development; fosters self-regulated learning
Relevance associated with sustained attention, investment of cognitive and affective resources in learning and identification with educational goals and aims
Many cognitive processes include opinions, routines, memory, comprehension etc.
Current problems with middle school and high school….curriculum and instructional design don’t change to adapt to changing developmental needs of students;
Middle school students report highest rates of boredom when doing schoolwork; complexity of work and cognitive demands doesn’t parellel what we know about cognitive changes across same ages (e.g., increases in abstract thought, hypothetical/deductive reasoning, social interest)

8. Level 2: Activity Structures and Groups
Instructional Formats
Whole Group Instruction
Small Group Instruction
Ability-based groups
vs.
Collaborative/cooperative groups
Individualized Instruction
Developmental changes in balance
Pros/cons of different small group formations
Within class ability groups highlight ability differences and increase social comparison and differential teacher treatment differential competence beliefs, friendship selection patterns
Vs. cooperative – mix of abilities, rewards/recognition to whole group; simultaneously supports social skill development
WHOLE GROUP and ABILITY BASED SMALL GROUP increase in frequency in middle and high school; just the time when social comparison and self-conciousness starts to rise naturally
Although reading groups based on ability start as early as 1st grade (think about cumulative effects on child)

9. Level 3: Teachers Beliefs, Instructional Practices, and Relationships with Students
Beliefs about:
Role of teacher
Weeder vs. cultivator
Beliefs about intelligence and goal orientation
Self-efficacy
Expectations for students’ performance
Differential treatment of students within same classroom based on
ability level (high rec’d preferential treatment)
Gender, race, ethnic groups, social class
Nature of Ability
Entity vs. incremental views of intelligence
How do these relate to goals?
Teacher factors
Weeder vs. cultivator
Differential treatment based on
Performance vs. mastery goals (entity views = performance; incremental views = mastery)
Develpmental changes in teachers’ beliefs – entry into middle school both students and teachers report school is more focused on competition, relative ability, and social comparison
Teachers’ sense of efficacy declines between elementary and middle school

10. Teachers’ allocation of class time

11. (Slight) Differential Allocation by Student Achievement
Math
Science
Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS)

12. Level 3: Teachers Beliefs, Instructional Practices, and Relationships with Students
Classroom climate optimal when teacher is high in
Supportiveness
Control
Balance of Control and Autonomy Granting
Promotes intrinsic motivation styles vs. learned helplessness
Why?
Middle and high school teachers use of more control-oriented strategies
Counter to the developmental quest for autonomy
why?
Goodness-of-fit between student and instructional environment
E.g., boys  reading; girls  science/math
Control includes efficient organization, stress on academics, focused goal-oriented lessons
(Discuss parallels with parenting literature – why is either one on its own not sufficient?)
Why? Dec & Ryan self-determination theory
Developmental changes show that middle and high school involves teachers’ use of more control-oriented strategies…which again is counter to the developmental quest for autonomy at that age; why do teachers do this?
Fewer opportunities for student decision making

13. Girls’ and STEM careers

14. Level 3: Relationships with Students
Trusting, caring, respectful teachers associated with optimal learning
Why?
 Feelings of security
allow children to approach, take initiative, engage, persist and take risk to develop positive achievement related self-perceptions
Parallels to attachment security

15. Level 4: Curriculum Differentiation and Academic Tracks
Within-class versus between-class groupings
Direct and indirect effects on child
Mixed effects depending on outcome measure and grouping characteristic
Negative academic outcomes for low-ability groups
Why?
Negative ability self-concepts for high-ability groups
Effects of social comparison
Within class grouping more common in elementary school with increasing prevalence of between class groupings with age
Indirect effects via peer group; grouping promotes continuity of contact with similar peers, aggressive children together changes classroom climate and expectations for acceptable behavior; changes in self-perceptions

16. Level 5: Whole School Environment
School size
School resources
Associated with race and class
Academic and social climate
Educational policies and practices
School ability orientation vs. school task orientation
Daily Schedule– Start / End Times
Tax structure; parent environment
After school activities

17. Level 6: Links between School, Home, Community
Protective effects of school-home linkage
Why?
Reasons teachers and/or parents wouldn’t solicit connection?
School-Community linkage
Ways to do this?
Service learning
Beneficial?

18. Challenges of School Transitions
Negative effects upon entry into middle school:
Declines in academic motivation,
interest in school,
achievement across early adolescent years (11-14);
Increases in test anxiety;
focus on self-evaluation rather than task mastery
Increased school truancy and dropout
Middle school misfit developmental stage
levels of teacher control and reduced student autonomy
affective relationships between students and teachers
teacher efficacy
organization of instruction
whole class instruction & between class ability groupings
grading practices (stricter grades)
motivational goals (emphasis on performance rather than mastery goals
Why? Pubertal changes

19. Gender-stereotypes during adolescence Is age the key variable?
T indicates children who have just transition from junior high school
Alfieri et al., 1996

20. Challenges of School Transitions
Mechanism?
Stage-environment fit theory
In what way do practices misfit with developmental stage in
Middle school?
High school?
How to optimize stage-environment fit theory in middle school?
In high school?

21. Neighborhood Influences
Direct and indirect effects of neighborhoods
Mediating variables?
family, school, peer networks
Mechanisms (Jencks & Mayer, 1990)
Contagion
Collective Socialization
Resource Exposure
Developmental changes in effects
more exposure and effect of direct influences
Mediating variables include family, school, peer networks
With age, more exposure and effect of direct influences

22. Peers as Mediators of School/ Neighborhood Effects
Cross-age peer tutoring
Early maturing girls at high risk for school dropout
Even after controlling for previous motivation and academic performance
Why?