Educational psychology is also concerned with the dynamics of learning. In his contribution to this course, George Reese analyzes by way of example the notion of "productive struggle." How can educational psychology help us to understand the processes of learning?

Productive struggle is when learners develop a habit of striving to think flexibly. Learners tend to look for the correct solution instead of knowing how to solve the problem. Encouraging students to think outside the box and pushing them through their struggles of finding the right strategy can help them be more productive in learning.

https://www.renaissance.com/edwords/productive-struggle/

An unknown source started the idea that people can either be good at maths or bad at maths. This has been widely spread as a “math person” or “not a math person”. However, Jo Boaler, a professor of mathematics education at Stanford and the co-founder of YouCubed extrapolates on the idea that we have an elastic brain and that if you believe you have a growth mindset you can in turn learn anything. We also need to take a look at how we pose questions in maths. We are normally using questions that are right or wrong but, we need to try and use a variety of questions to change the way people look at the problem and the answer. The most notable aspect of math learning is that when you make a mistake you actually engage your brain even more when looking at MRI scans and brain activity. This productive struggle helps the learner grow and push their limits to continuously learn.

TEDx Talk by Jo Boaler: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3icoSeGqQtY

According to Rishi Sriram, productive struggle is a vital part of the learning process. When taking a deeper look at the neuroscience behind productive struggle we can see that Myelin is responsible for the better results. Learning is a constant process and inside the brain there are three components involved, namely, neurons, synapses and myelin. The neurons are nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that have branches to receive signals from the brain and connect the messages to other neurons. The neurons connect with other neurons through synapses which is the space between two neurons. Myelin is a fatty like substance that resembles sausage links covering the neuron branches or axons. The more you practice a specific task the more myelin gets wrapped around making the bond between two neurons stronger. The signals travel much faster this way and create a paved way towards learning. When a skill is first learned this connection is slow and gradually gets stronger.

There are four ways that productive struggle can help enhance a student’s learning. Retrieval (assisting learners to recall information that is forgotten is an essential part of learning), interleaving (mixed practice helps the brain pave better roads and adding previous concepts helps students deepen their learning, they will make more mistakes but improve in the long term), spacing (distributing the practice evenly overtime) and mindfulness. These concepts cover that struggling is an essential part of learning and development of any learner. Without the struggle there would not be a deeper understanding of the skills or concepts learned. The brain needs to pave better roads and with the struggle the roads will be better. This seems counterintuitive but the difficulty pays off in the long run.

Rishi Sharma, April 2020 https://www.edutopia.org/article/neuroscience-behind-productive-struggle

How does educational psychology contribute to our understanding? What evidence does it offer?

Educational psychology is a wide topic that ranges from learning processes, developmental and behavioural psychology, cognitive development of students, relationship between the learner and the teacher, the learning process etc.

https://www.britannica.com/science/educational-psychology

There are many notable figures who played an important role in the rising of educational psychology and the understanding of how our minds develop using various techniques. Alfred Binet developed the intelligence tests; John Locke brought up the idea of “tabula rasa”; Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development or B.F.Skinner with operational conditioning. However a large group consider Johann Herbert the father of educational psychology because he believed that the learner’s interest in the topic influenced the learning outcome and that this should be considered when delivering instructions.

Understanding Learning through Educational Psychology

Taking into consideration that many approaches and perspectives have been developed throughout time we cannot use them all or assume they all work. There is no one rule in educational psychology that works for everyone. The field is constantly evolving to better understand the learner as well as how they absorb and retain information. By understanding each individual learner we can apply the right theory of human development and proceed with the instructions. We learn everyday in every setting and psychologists closely study all these situations to improve learning and make it effective.

https://www.apa.org/action/science/teaching-learning#:~:text=Educational%20psychologists%20apply%20theories%20of,and%20inform%20the%20instructional%20process.&text=Psychologists%20working%20in%20this%20subfield,to%20make%20learning%20more%20effective.

What interpretative concepts and theories does it provide?

There are quite a few interpretative concepts and theories as seen earlier from quite a few notable scientists. Some major perspectives include: behavioural, where all behaviour is learned through conditioning; developmental is understanding how children acquire new skills at different stages of development; cognitive is how memories, emotions, beliefs and motivations affect the learning process; constructivist approach is focused on how learners construct their knowledge of the world.

Through this build up of educational psychology we can put together different theories and conclude that there are various factors that contribute to our understanding. Teachers use one or all of the various researched theories in their classrooms to develop young learner’s minds towards understanding and sparking interest in topics. These theories are widely used in various times in history and more recently the constructivist approach is widely used because these are heavily backed by data and evidence of success.

Kendra Cherry, Jan 2020 https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-educational-psychology-2795157#:~:text=By%20understanding%20how%20children%20think,each%20point%20of%20their%20growth.&text=Cognitive%20psychology%20focuses%20on%20understanding,%2C%20remember%2C%20and%20process%20information.

The role of an educational psychologist today has two areas: the systemic level as well as the individual level. They work directly with the teachers, students, and parents to better understand the learner’s perspective and provide a better environment for the learner. The thought of how to get that child to be onboard learning and retain the knowledge. They also work in the systemic level developing assessments and research based work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4q81wxvfjro