MAHA TET Paper 2: Child Development and Pedagogy Test - 6 (Science and Mathematics) - MAHA TET MCQ

Cognitive abilities are brain-based skills we need to carry out any task from the simplest to the most complex. They have more to do with the mechanisms of how we learn, remember, problem-solve, reason out, and pay attention rather than with any actual knowledge.

An inclusive classroom includes each and every category of children in the educational system, regardless of their differences and disabilities. In an inclusive classroom, all creative, gifted, intelligent, backward, mentally retarded children study together.

• Creativity is a cognitive ability to produce something original by offering a fresh perspective. It is the ability possessed by people who are creative, persistent, and imaginative.
• Creative children are those who show high-performance capability in several areas such as artistic and creative work, leadership quality, keen power of observation, etc.

The hyperactive children need special attention in the classroom.
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) belongs to the group of externalising disorders of childhood. The term hyperactive is familiar to most people, especially parents and teachers. The child who is constantly in motion, tapping fingers, jiggling legs, poking others for no apparent reason, talking out of turn, and fidgeting is often called hyperactive. These children also have difficulty concentrating on the task at hand for an appropriate period of time.

• Children with ADHD seem to have particular difficulty controlling their activity in situations that call for sitting still, such as in the classroom or at mealtimes. When required to be quiet, they appear unable to stop moving or talking.
• They have poor attention to details and distractibility. Their activities are often disorganised. They are often forgetful and leave many activities incomplete, make many silly mistakes in school work.
• Due to poor attention, they fail to comprehend long instructions, even avoid activities that require sustained attention. Thus, they require special attention in the classroom.

Mastery learning is a term, formulated by John B.Carrol (1971) and Benjamin Bloom (1971). It provides a compact and interesting way of increasing the likelihood that more students will attain a satisfactory level of performance in school subjects. First, all students are taught together in the same way and the method of teaching is equal for all the learners. Then, a mastery test is given to check, if students have mastered the subject. Those students are separated who could not master the subject, and diagnose their difficulty and divide them into various groups according to their problems. They are given mastery learning according to their difficulty requirements and then again they are checked by mastery test.

The concept of Zone of Proximal Development is given by  Lev Vygotsky. Zone of Proximal Development or ZPD is the set of skills a child can't do on his own but can do with the help of guidance of a more knowledgeable other. 

Noam Chomsky, known as the father of modern linguistics, has made a crucial contribution in the field of linguistics.
Let's understand Chomsky's view about language in brief:

• Innate ability: He strongly believes that children are born with an innate knowledge of grammar that serves as the basis for all language acquisition.
• Generative grammar: According to Chomsky it refers to a finite set of rules to generate sentences and can be used to produce more sentences in that language.
• Universal grammar: Chomsky's universal grammar suggests that all children have an innate ability to acquire, understand and develop grammar.
• Language Acquisition Device: Chomsky proposed that humans are equipped with a language acquisition device that enables a child to acquire and produce language.

A brief description of other psychologists:

So, Noam Chomsky is associated with ‘language development'.

A slow learner is a child whose IQ is low enough to cause considerable difficulty in keeping up in the classroom. An average IQ is 100. Slow learners score between 70 and 90 on IQ tests. Less than 70 is considered mentally retarded.

Kohlberg Theory: The theory focuses mainly on the development of moral reasoning and morality among children and has given 6 stages for the same. The theory also suggests that moral logic is primarily focused on seeking and maintaining justice.

(i), (iii) and (iv) statement are best suited to cater to individual differences of students.
By individual differences, we mean physical and behavioural variations, seen in all species including human beings. Some of us are tall, some short, some bright and some are dull.  Some of the instructional strategies are discussed below-

• The methods of teaching should be in keeping with the needs of the individuals.
• The curriculum should be organized and made flexible as per the needs and requirements of the individual.
• Instruction should aim at the development of the student's cognitive process beyond the attainment of information alone. 
• In a heterogeneous classroom situation, you can organize instruction based on ability grouping where students are grouped according to the level of their ability, and instruction is modified as stated above to suit the level of their ability.
• The methods of teaching should be in keeping with the needs of the individuals.

Age is a personal matter. It doesn't reflect environment, cognition or society. So, option (2) is the correct answer.

Lawrence Kohlberg, an American psychologist, has propounded the 'Theory of Moral Development'. He has made a systematic study of moral development in his theory that is categorised into 3 levels and 6 stages.

Imitation learning mainly influences the personality of the child. Imitation is an advanced behavior whereby an individual observes and replicates another's behavior. An imitation is also a form of social learning that leads to the "development of traditions, and ultimately our culture.

Frobel's most important contribution to education was his development of the kindergarten. Frobel's method inspired and informed the work of Maria Montessori, Rudolf Steiner and others, who adopted his ideas and adapted his materials according to their own work.

According to Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development, assimilation, accommodation, and equilibrium are the ways through which children integrate new experiences into already existing cognition structures (schema). 

"Development process lags behind learning process" best summarizes the relationship between development and learning as proposed by Vygotsky.
According to Vygotsky, learning is a process that occurs anytime in everyday life and that isn't just an external phenomenon. His theory of Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) expanded learning and development, which posits that learning precedes development processes.

• Development: It refers to a progressive and systematic series of changes that occur in the life of an individual he/she grows from infancy to old age.
• Learning: The process by which a person alters his responses and behavior in order to adjust himself to the changing environment is called learning.

The RTE Act provides for The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education till completion of elementary education in a neighbourhood school. It clarifies that 'compulsory education' means obligation of the appropriate government to provide free elementary education and ensure compulsory admission, attendance and completion of elementary education to every child in the six to fourteen age group.
'Free' means that no child shall be liable to pay any kind of fee or charges or expenses which may prevent him or her from pursuing and completing elementary education. It makes provisions for a non-admitted child to be admitted to an age appropriate class.

Thinking is a higher cognitive process. In the literature, it has been defined primarily in two ways; one category of definition considers thinking as a problem-solving activity. While the other class of definition considers it as a mechanism of an internal representation of the external world.

Vygotsky's social development theory laid the foundations for Constructivism.
Constructivism: It is the theory which backs the idea that child construct their knowledge by themselves when they explore. Lev Vygotsky, who idealized the fact that children learn whey they collaborate with others, derived sociocultural theory which says that development takes place due to the intermingling of culture, social interaction (which has three components explained below), and language.
Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD): It is the zone a child wants to master in. For example, if he wants to learn chess, it would be ZPD for him.
More knowledgable other (MKO): To learn chess, when he needs a person who is good at chess, that person is more knowledgable other.
Scaffolding: It is the help or motivation that is provided by MKO to that child.
Thus, it can be concluded that Vygotsky's social development theory laid the foundations for ​Constructivism.

Extinction (psychology) is observed in both operantly conditioned and classically conditioned behaviours. When operant behaviour that has been previously reinforced no longer produces reinforcing consequences, the behaviour gradually stops occurring.
A partial reinforcement will continue to produce reinforcing consequences and therefore, making it difficult to stop a behaviour from re-occurring.

Lev Vygotsky is a Russian Psychologist who proposed the theory of Socio-cultural development.

Intelligence refers to a set of different cognitive abilities to think rationally, act purposefully, resolve problems and deal with the demands of the environment.
The Theory of Multiple Intelligence:
Howard Gardner proposed this theory wherein he formulated eight categories of intelligence. He defined intelligence as “Intelligence is a bio-psychological potential to process information that can be activated in a cultural setting to solve problems or create products that are of value in a culture”.
To define intelligence more broadly, Gardner established several criteria for defining intelligence:

• the potential for brain isolation by brain damage
• its place in evolutionary history
• the presence of core operations
• susceptibility to encoding
• a distinct developmental progression
• the existence of idiot-savants, prodigies and other exceptional people
• support from experimental psychology
• support from psychometric findings

From the criteria mentioned above he formulated the following types of intelligence:

From the above table, it becomes clear that 'skeptical' is not a type of intelligence formulated by Howard Gardner.

'Prediction' is the characteristic of aptitude. 'Aptitude' means 'a natural ability to do something'.

Noam Chomsky, known as the father of modern linguistics, has made a crucial contribution in the field of linguistics.

Cephalocaudal Principle: It states that growth and development follow a pattern that starts with the head then proceeds to the rest of the body (head to foot).
The cephalocaudal principle refers to the general pattern of physical and motoric development followed from infancy into toddlerhood and even early childhood whereby development follows a head-to-toe progression.

Systematic presentation of concepts may be related to 'Development proceeds from heteronomy to autonomy'. Heteronomy means dependence on others, while autonomy means self reliance. Young children are dependent on others for their care and welfare, but adolescents are capable of taking care of themselves. This shows the movement from heteronomy to autonomy.

ICT stands for Information Communication Technology which plays a major role in the field of education. ICTs offer a great potential to support lifelong learning for all groups of students, including those who have special needs. 

The Piaget theory of cognitive development has used the following two stages or activities, namely, organization and adaptation as described below:
Adaptation: According to Piaget, children have an innate tendency to adjust to their environment. This trend has been termed 'adaptation'. According to him, the child starts adapting to the environment from the beginning
Organization: When a child encounters an aggravating situation, their individual mental activities do not work separately, but they work together and collectively help them to acquire knowledge. At the mental level, this activity happens continuously. Adaptation to the environment is the result of the organization.

Mastery learning is a term, formulated by John B.Carrol (1971) and Benjamin Bloom (1971). It provides a compact and interesting way of increasing the likelihood that more students will attain a satisfactory level of performance in school subjects. First, all students are taught together in the same way and the method of teaching is equal for all the learners. Then, a mastery test is given to check, if students have mastered the subject. Those students are separated who could not master the subject, and diagnose their difficulty and divide them into various groups according to their problems. They are given mastery learning according to their difficulty requirements and then again they are checked by mastery test.

The concept of Zone of Proximal Development is given by  Lev Vygotsky. Zone of Proximal Development or ZPD is the set of skills a child can't do on his own but can do with the help of guidance of a more knowledgeable other. 

• Individuals who have the ability to understand the motives, feelings and behaviours of others to bond with them are high on interpersonal Intelligence in Howard Gardner’s theory.
• Interpersonal intelligence: In this type of intelligence people have the ability to understand others' feelings, wishes, expectations, and needs & others' behavior.
• These people have better social communication skills and have the ability to relate well with others and manage relationships.

Thus, people having interpersonal intelligence have the ability to interact with others in society.