Joe Ames

11 February 2018
Reflection on InTASC 1: Learner Development
The first InTASC standard is concerned with the many developments that learners undergo.

To be an effective English teacher, I must first understand the development stages my students

will be undergoing. As adolescents, they will be at varying stages of cognitive, linguistic, social,

emotional, and physical development, and as their teacher, it is imperative that I recognize and

understand this, making adjustments and accommodations along the way. Some students will be

more socially adept then others, so discussion, an important activity in the English classroom, will

come more naturally to them. To help those who are less socially developed, I can provide small

group work and writing before the whole-class discussion. These activities will help shyer students

rehearse responses before going into the larger group and assist students who are struggling with

the content gain understanding. For those students who struggle with talking out of turn or

changing the conversation topic, I can set expectations for my class. This could include students

having to announce when they are changing the topic of the discussion (and receiving approval

from classmates to do so) and reminding them that, since we value what others have to say, we

cannot interrupt them. Students who struggle with communicating their ideas can be given

sentence frames to help them contribute without the pressure of generating the entirety of their

input. By making these accommodations, I can help students learn how to discuss and collaborate

with peers. Student learning will be heavily determined by my understanding and implementation

of these theories of development. If I do not assess students in order to gauge their development

in the various fields, I will not be able to provide adequately rigorous lesson plans. If I’m not aware

of the variance between and among these stages and types of development, I’ll wind up writing

lesson plans that are unfortunately boring, frustratingly difficult, or hilariously unimportant to my
students. Student learning will be heavily determined by their placement in the variety of stages

of development. These developmental stages determine what students are capable of cognitively,

linguistically, what they prefer socially, and what they are concerned about emotionally and

physically. By being aware of this, I can plan effective lessons that are developmentally

appropriate.