Educational Psychology: Why Praising Smarts Can Backfire
How children think, what keeps students going, why study habits mislead us, and how a teacher's expectations quietly shape a class.
Try 3 questions
1. A five-year-old watches water poured from a short, wide glass into a tall, thin one. What does she usually say?
- The tall glass has more water
- Both glasses hold the same water
- The wide glass had more water
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Answer: The tall glass has more water
Before about age seven, children tend to focus on one dimension, height, and do not yet grasp that the amount is conserved.
2. What is Vygotsky's 'zone of proximal development'?
- Tasks too hard even with expert help
- Skills a learner has already mastered
- What a learner can do only with help
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Answer: What a learner can do only with help
The ZPD is the gap between what a child can do alone and what they can do with guidance; teaching aimed there moves development forward.
3. The teaching term 'scaffolding' is often credited to Vygotsky. Who actually introduced it, in 1976?
- Lev Vygotsky and student Alexander Luria
- David Wood, Jerome Bruner and Gail Ross
- Jean Piaget and colleague Bärbel Inhelder
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Answer: David Wood, Jerome Bruner and Gail Ross
Wood, Bruner and Ross coined 'scaffolding' to describe tutoring; it was later linked to Vygotsky's ideas, though he never used the word.
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