Originally published in 1977, Psychology for the Classroom is offered as an aid to people who are learning themselves and helping other people to learn: that is, to parents, students and particularly to teachers. The activity of teaching, to be successful, requires the teacher to understand the behaviour of the learner as fully as possible. Some of the insights into human behaviour gained by psychologists may prove helpful to the teacher in complementing his or her experience and intuitive understanding, and it is with this in mind that the topics covered in this book have been selected.
Section one deals with cognitive aspects, an understanding of which his essential since cognitive processes are the means by which individuals are able to make sense of their environment. Section two considers the social situation in which knowledge and understanding develop, i.e. the way in which social interaction affects learning. Section three focuses on the individual, stressing that academic achievement depends not only on hard work but is intimately related to an individual’s personal development and personality.
The book will be valuable to psychology students, student teachers and teachers on in-service courses, for its coverage of relevant psychological research and the description of pertinent experiments and studies of the time. Its originality lies in the way in which it communicates the importance of teachers using psychology as a basis for forming hypotheses which they can test for themselves – not necessarily as researchers, but in a mood of personal exploration.