Amanda's Interview With Children

For this assignment I decided to interview a child who I see regularly when my co- worker brings her into work some afternoons. She chose to be called by the name of “Amanda.” Amanda is in the first grade and is 7 years old. During her last parent teacher conference, the teacher had absolutely nothing bad to say about Amanda because she excels in all aspects of school. She quite often finds school less challenging than other students in her classroom, and is frequently bored during school activities and learning. She breezes through the at home assignments and normally competes a whole week’s material in one night! For my assignment I decided to see how Amanda would perform on the mountain task. I sent up a folder that hid some objects from …show more content…
Just everyday tasks will show you where a child falls with their cognitive abilities. I decided to ask Amanda a series of questions about how she prefers to learn and who she likes to learn with. I have provided you with some of her answers to a few of the many questions I asked her. I put her answers together in the most logical way so you could best understand what she was trying to say. The first question I asked her was “Do you like to learn with friends or by yourself?” Her response was a little messy but went something like this… “I think I like both, sometimes it’s hard for me to work in groups. But it’s fun to learn as a class on the ABC carpet!” My next question was: “What way do you think the teacher would say is the best way for you to learn?” She was a little confused by this question, and after some one on one conversation she understood and responded, “I think my teacher would say I learn best when she talks and tells me how to do it. Not with friends, because they talk to …show more content…
She had trouble understanding the questions but overall I think that these simple questions brought the answers I expected. I think she might have been a little distracted while answering these questions, and that might be the reason for the slight confusion to the questions. Vygotsky’s theory says that there is a “Zone of Proximal Development.” This is the zone that occurs between what you know and what you learn with help from others. She can learn very well with others but learns better when she receives direct instruction. Her mother also says she often talks herself through tasks, such as her math homework. This supports Vygotsky’s private speech theory. I’m sure when she gets older she will be able to do this without actually verbalizing it but for now she talks quietly to herself in order to fully understand the task at