Chapter 7 Study Guide - Cengage Learning

Chapter 7 Study Guide

Introduction
• Why a skilled early childhood educator can be characterized as a “responsive

opportunist”
• Why it is important for teachers to create a classroom atmosphere where

children can expect success, see the teacher as a significant person, are
allowed choice, and are able to make mistakes
• Why adult-child interaction is especially important in preschools serving poor
children
• The basics of the Abecedarian Project, including what it involved, and how
effective it was over time

Teaching Strategies and Behaviors
• The three specific teaching functions that encourage the development of

language arts and literacy
• Why it is important that these three functions be balanced, relative to each

child’s level and individual needs
• The relationship between a teacher’s training and the quality of teacher-child

interactions
• What effective teacher observation requires
• How a teacher’s observations affect the daily program
• Why listening intimately is highly advisable
• Why a teacher who feels that unplanned teacher talk is less important than

talk in teacher-guided activities can be limited in his ability to support
problem-solving, child discovery, and child expression of events important to
the child

The Teacher as a Model
• The ways in which teachers act as models
• How, according to Bernstein, social class effects the style of verbal interaction
• The characteristics of restricted code speech
• The characteristics of elaborate code speech
• The relationship between speakers’ styles of communication and the young

child’s development of cognitive structures and modes of communication
• The five high-level distancing strategies
• The three low-level distancing strategies
• What explanatory talk is and what it involves
• Why explanatory talk is a preferred behavior in early childhood teachers’

verbal interactive exchanges
• How adults should speak when conversing with young children
• Why the reward in the form of attention is important as teachers deal with

young children’s attitudes, skills, and behaviors in language arts activities
• The types of language patterns educators should use, and why
• What the proper modeling of words and sentences involves

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• What children do when they hear corrections modeled
• Why it is important to focus on the meaning of what is said more so than the

way it is said
• The three recommended strategies to improve listening when talking with

young children
• What expansion is and how it is used
• Why the practice of expansion is recommended, even though research has

not shown that it has a significant positive effect
• Why it is important for teachers to model listening in addition to modeling

speaking
• The benefit of modeling good printscript form
• Why teachers model the proper use and care of books
• How a teacher’s modeling of his or her thinking promotes children to think

along the same lines

The Teacher as Provider
• The types of experiences that preschool teachers strive to provide
• What an activity file is, and why it is recommended that preschool teachers

create them
• How an activity file is used
• The 31 recommended file headings
• How a typical classroom object can be used as a program tool to stimulate

language
• Why it is important for teachers to incorporate their own interests into

activities
• Why abundant play opportunities are recommended for young children
• What the teacher should do if a child chooses to engage in conversation with

the teacher during, or instead of, play
• How a child’s exploratory play leads to conversations with adults
• How children learn language from one another through play
• The relative amount of time that should be fit into the schedule for

uninterrupted play
• How the teacher techniques used in building children’s language competence

and vocabulary in language arts can be used in other content areas
• Why accuracy and specificity are important when talking with young children
• Why teachers should not be reluctant to use big, new words, and what they

should do immediately after using them
• How new terms should be introduced

The Teacher—an Educator who Interacts
• The characteristics and general practices of a teacher who interacts
• Examples of ways to initiate conversations with young children
• What the term “reciprocal opportunity” refers to in regard to a teacher’s work

with young children, and what teachers do to take advantage of it

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• Why it is important to allow opportunities that would make children want and
need to talk occur

• Why teachers might need to raise their own awareness of their interactions
with children

• How teachers reveal their values through what they attend to
• Why it is wise for teachers to be aware of and up-to-date on topics of special

interest to preschoolers
• What extension is and what it involves
• What closure is and what it involves
• Why it is important that teachers value every child, and what they should be

valued for
• Why Weitzman urges teacher waiting behavior
• The relationship between adult speech containing a relatively high proportion

of statements or declaratives and the rate of language development in young
children
• Why showing interest when answering a child is recommended
• The seven types of questions identified by Kucan, and examples of each
• Why the other six types of questions are preferred over memory questions
• The five interaction techniques and items of advice to extend conversations
• How a teacher acts as an interpreter, and why the teacher should not be
worried about making faulty interpretations
• The four language-developing teacher speech interactions that may be used
in conversations with young children, as identified by Harris
• Why teacher-child conversations should be similar to adult conversations
• Why it is important to remember to converse with all students (including the
quiet ones) each day
• How teachers naturally adjust their speech when speaking to children of
different ages and language abilities
• Examples of situations in which it is wise for the teacher to refrain from
speaking
• How a teacher’s daily interactions can help improve a child’s ability to see
relationships
• Why, when supplying words to fit situations, it is important to repeat new
words in a subtle way
• What fast mapping is and when it occurs
• Why it is important that, when introducing and using a new word, you also use
words around the new word that give clues to its meaning
• What the teacher can do if he or she does not wish to answer a question
directly
• What teachers can do to promote children’s curiosity about words
• The four-to-five-step process involved in using the “teachable moment”
strategy
• What is necessary in order to be consciously trying to be specific and
expanding

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Scaffolding
• What scaffolding is and what it involves
• The purpose of using scaffolding
• How the need for scaffolding changes as the child ages
• The 11 types of specific teacher verbalizations and behaviors that are

suggested in scaffolding

Teacher Interactive Styles
• The two teaching styles and what each involves
• Why it is easy for many teachers to use the transmission style of teaching
• The benefits of using the interpretation style of teaching
• When a teacher should and should not become involved in a child’s symbolic

play
• The types of comments a teacher that is interested in stressing connections

between classroom language arts events and activities, as is done in an
integrated approach or a whole language approach, may purposefully make
• Why it is important for adults to accept and celebrate beginning attempts at
language
• The different ways in which teachers can handle children’s interruptions
• What Montessori’s three-stage interaction approach does and how it works
• Other types of sequential approaches, and what each involves
• Six ways in which teachers can interact skillfully with young children
• How a child’s past experiences might affect his or her behaviors
• What teachers should do to promote child learning with children with varied
past experiences
• How teachers react to children’s guessing and error-making in an atmosphere
of trust
• Ways in which literacy features can be integrated into outdoor activities

The Teacher as a Balancer
• The seven things a teacher must do to maintain a balance in all roles
• Why it is important for a teacher’s attitude toward child growth in language to

be one of optimism
• Why teachers screen their comments and conversation when interacting with

young children
• The benefit of giving children the opportunity to re-express what they have

discovered, felt, or learned in their play and/or activities

©2010 Wadsworth, Cengage Learning