Challenging Tasks Are More Likely Than Easy Ones to Promote

question 21

Multiple Choice

Challenging tasks are more likely than easy ones to promote students' learning and cognitive development.Yet students sometimes resist such challenges.Which one of the following strategies is consistent with the textbook's recommendation for how to incorporate challenging activities into the classroom curriculum?

• A)Start the year with few if any requirements, allowing students to feel comfortable in their new classroom, and then begin assigning challenging tasks after a week or two.
• B)Explain to students that they have little to gain from doing things they already know how to do.
• C)Start the year with relatively easy tasks that give students a sense of success, then gradually increase the difficulty level of assignments.
• D)Start the year with extremely difficult assignments, then make them slightly easier after a few days.

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Definitions:

Corpus Callosum

The large bundle of axons that connects the brain’s two hemispheres, responsible for relaying information between the two sides.

Cognitive Development

Refers to the process of growth and change in intellectual/mental abilities such as thinking, reasoning, and understanding over the course of a human life.

Sensorimotor Stage

Piaget’s first stage of cognitive development, lasting from birth to about two years of age, during which infants construct an understanding of the world by coordinating sensory experiences with motor (physical) actions.

Synaptic Connections

The points at which nerve cells (neurons) connect and communicate with each other, playing a critical role in transmitting information throughout the nervous system.