- Piaget's sensorimotor stage
- Birth to ~2 years; the child learns through senses and motor action and develops object permanence.
- Piaget's preoperational stage
- ~2 to 7 years; symbolic thought and language emerge, but thinking is egocentric and lacks conservation.
- Piaget's concrete operational stage
- ~7 to 11 years; logical thinking about concrete objects; masters conservation, classification, and reversibility. Most K-6 students.
- Piaget's formal operational stage
- ~11 years and up; abstract, hypothetical 'what-if' reasoning becomes possible.
- Object permanence
- Knowing that objects continue to exist even when out of sight; develops in Piaget's sensorimotor stage.
- Conservation (Piaget)
- Understanding that quantity stays the same despite changes in shape or arrangement; mastered in the concrete operational stage.
- Egocentrism (Piaget)
- A preoperational child's difficulty seeing a situation from another person's point of view.
- Schema (Piaget)
- A mental framework that organizes knowledge; new information is assimilated into it or it is accommodated to fit.
- Assimilation
- Fitting new information into an existing schema without changing the schema.
- Accommodation
- Altering an existing schema to incorporate new information that does not fit.
- Equilibration
- Piaget's process of balancing assimilation and accommodation to build stable understanding.
- Vygotsky's sociocultural theory
- Learning is fundamentally social; cognitive growth comes from interaction with more knowledgeable others within a culture.
- Zone of proximal development (ZPD)
- The gap between what a learner can do alone and what they can do with guidance; the prime target for instruction.
- More knowledgeable other (MKO)
- Anyone (teacher, peer, parent) with greater skill who can guide a learner through the ZPD.
- Scaffolding
- Temporary, structured support within the ZPD that is gradually withdrawn as the learner becomes capable.
- Erikson's psychosocial stages
- Eight stages, each with a central conflict; elementary children face industry vs. inferiority.
- Industry vs. inferiority
- Erikson's stage for ages ~6-12: children develop competence through accomplishment or feelings of inadequacy.
- Identity vs. role confusion
- Erikson's adolescent stage: forming a coherent sense of self.
- Kohlberg's stages of moral development
- Three levels — preconventional, conventional, postconventional — describing how moral reasoning matures.
- Preconventional morality
- Kohlberg's earliest level: right and wrong are judged by punishment and reward.
- Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems
- A model placing the child within nested environments (micro-, meso-, exo-, macro-, chronosystem) that shape development.
- Behaviorism
- A theory that learning is a change in behavior caused by environmental stimuli and consequences.
- Classical conditioning
- Pavlov's learning by association: a neutral stimulus paired with a meaningful one comes to trigger a response.
- Operant conditioning
- Skinner's theory that behavior is shaped by its consequences — reinforcement and punishment.
- Positive reinforcement
- Adding a pleasant stimulus after a behavior to increase that behavior.
- Negative reinforcement
- Removing an unpleasant stimulus to increase a behavior; 'negative' means subtracting, not 'bad.'
- Positive punishment
- Adding an unpleasant consequence to decrease a behavior.
- Negative punishment
- Removing a pleasant stimulus (e.g., taking away recess) to decrease a behavior.
- Extinction
- Reducing a behavior by withholding the reinforcement that previously rewarded it.
- Constructivism
- A theory that learners actively build understanding from experience rather than passively receiving facts.
- Social learning theory (Bandura)
- People learn by observing and imitating models; reinforcement of the model influences the observer.
- Observational learning / modeling
- Acquiring behavior by watching others, central to Bandura's social learning theory.
- Self-efficacy (Bandura)
- A person's belief in their ability to succeed at a specific task; it shapes effort and persistence.
- Information processing theory
- A model of memory as input → sensory register → working memory → long-term memory.
- Working (short-term) memory
- Limited-capacity memory that holds and manipulates information briefly; chunking expands its effective capacity.
- Long-term memory
- Relatively permanent storage; information moves here through rehearsal and meaningful encoding.
- Chunking
- Grouping items into meaningful units to hold more in working memory (e.g., a phone number).
- Metacognition
- Thinking about one's own thinking — planning, monitoring, and evaluating one's learning.
- Gardner's multiple intelligences
- Intelligence as several relatively independent abilities (linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalist).
- Interpersonal intelligence
- Gardner's ability to understand and work well with others.
- Intrapersonal intelligence
- Gardner's self-awareness and understanding of one's own feelings.
- Intrinsic motivation
- Motivation from within — curiosity, interest, or the satisfaction of mastery.
- Extrinsic motivation
- Motivation from outside rewards or pressures such as grades, stickers, or praise.
- Maslow's hierarchy of needs
- Lower needs (physiological, safety) must be reasonably met before higher needs (belonging, esteem, self-actualization) motivate behavior.
- Physiological needs
- Maslow's base level: food, water, rest, warmth — must be met before learning.
- Self-actualization
- Maslow's top level: achieving one's full potential.
- Growth mindset (Dweck)
- The belief that ability grows with effort and strategy; fostered by praising process, not fixed talent.
- Fixed mindset
- The belief that ability is static and unchangeable; tends to reduce persistence after failure.
- Attribution theory
- How learners explain their successes and failures (ability, effort, luck, difficulty) shapes future motivation.
- Locus of control
- Whether a student credits outcomes to internal factors (effort) or external ones (luck); internal locus supports effort.
- Learned helplessness
- A state in which repeated failure leads a student to stop trying, believing effort won't matter.
- Flow / optimal challenge
- Deep engagement that occurs when a task's difficulty matches the learner's skill.
- Cooperative learning's motivational value
- Structured peer interaction can raise engagement, belonging, and accountability.
- English language learner (ELL)
- A student learning English as an additional language; benefits from visuals, peer support, and comprehensible input.
- Comprehensible input
- Language presented just above the learner's current level, supported so it can be understood.
- BICS vs. CALP
- Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (social, ~1-2 yrs) vs. Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (academic, ~5-7 yrs).
- Culturally responsive teaching
- Instruction that draws on students' cultural backgrounds and experiences to make learning relevant.
- Gifted and talented learners
- Students who need enrichment, acceleration, or depth beyond the standard curriculum.
- Learning disability
- A neurological difference affecting specific skills (e.g., dyslexia in reading) despite typical intelligence.
- ADHD
- Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder; supported with structure, movement breaks, and clear, chunked tasks.
- Readiness
- A learner's current developmental and prior-knowledge level; instruction should meet students where they are.
- Resilience
- The capacity to recover from setbacks; supported by relationships, structure, and a growth mindset.
- Prior knowledge / schema activation
- Connecting new learning to what students already know improves comprehension and retention.
- Transfer of learning
- Applying knowledge or skills learned in one context to a new situation.
- Learning objective
- A clear, measurable statement of what students will be able to do, using an observable action verb.
- Measurable vs. vague verbs
- Use observable verbs (list, solve, analyze) instead of unmeasurable ones (understand, know, appreciate).
- Bloom's taxonomy (revised)
- A hierarchy of cognitive skills: remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate, create.
- Remember (Bloom's)
- The lowest level: recall facts and basic concepts (list, define, name).
- Understand (Bloom's)
- Explain ideas or concepts (summarize, paraphrase, classify).
- Apply (Bloom's)
- Use information in new situations (solve, demonstrate, implement).
- Analyze (Bloom's)
- Draw connections and break information apart (compare, contrast, categorize).
- Evaluate (Bloom's)
- Justify a stand or decision (judge, critique, defend).
- Create (Bloom's)
- The highest level: produce new or original work (design, compose, construct).
- Higher-order thinking
- Cognitive work above recall — analysis, evaluation, and creation; promoted by open-ended questions.
- Backward design
- Planning by starting from the desired results, then assessments, then learning activities (Wiggins & McTighe).
- Curriculum alignment
- Ensuring objectives, instruction, and assessment all target the same intended learning.
- Anticipatory set / hook
- An opening that activates prior knowledge and engages students at the start of a lesson.
- Direct instruction
- A teacher-led, explicit, sequential method best for teaching clear skills or procedures.
- Inquiry-based learning
- Students build understanding by investigating questions and problems.
- Discovery learning
- Students learn concepts through exploration and guided experience rather than direct telling.
- Project-based learning
- Extended, authentic projects through which students learn and apply content.
- Cooperative learning
- Structured group work with positive interdependence and individual accountability.
- Jigsaw (cooperative)
- A structure where each member becomes an expert on one part, then teaches the group.
- Think-pair-share
- Students think individually, discuss with a partner, then share with the class.
- Differentiated instruction
- Adjusting content, process, product, or environment to fit varied readiness, interest, and learning profiles.
- Differentiating content
- Changing WHAT students learn or the materials used to access it.
- Differentiating process
- Changing HOW students make sense of content (activities, grouping, support).
- Differentiating product
- Changing HOW students demonstrate learning (essay, model, presentation).
- Tiered assignments
- Tasks at varied difficulty levels addressing the same objective for different readiness groups.
- Flexible grouping
- Regrouping students by need, interest, or skill rather than fixed ability tracks.
- Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
- Designing instruction with multiple means of engagement, representation, and action/expression from the start.
- Gradual release of responsibility
- I do (model) → we do (guided) → you do together (collaborative) → you do alone (independent).
- Modeling / 'I do'
- The teacher demonstrates and thinks aloud, providing full support.
- Guided practice / 'we do'
- Teacher and students practice together with scaffolds still in place.
- Independent practice / 'you do'
- Students apply a skill on their own once scaffolds are removed.
- Wait time
- The pause after a question (and after a response); 3-5 seconds yields longer, higher-quality answers.
- Open-ended question
- A question with many possible responses that promotes higher-order thinking and discussion.
- Closed / convergent question
- A question with one correct answer, useful for quick recall checks.
- Bloom-leveled questioning
- Varying question difficulty across Bloom's levels to challenge all learners.
- Probing question
- A follow-up that pushes a student to clarify, justify, or extend an answer.
- Redirecting
- Inviting other students to respond or build on a peer's answer.
- Effective cueing
- Clear verbal, visual, and kinesthetic prompts that guide student attention and response.
- Active vs. passive learning
- Active learning has students do, discuss, and apply; passive learning has them only receive information.
- Advance organizer (Ausubel)
- A framework presented before a lesson that helps students connect new material to prior knowledge.
- Graphic organizer
- A visual tool (web, Venn diagram, chart) that structures information to aid understanding.
- Concept mapping
- Diagramming relationships among ideas to build and reveal conceptual understanding.
- Manipulatives
- Concrete objects (counters, blocks) that help students, especially concrete-operational learners, grasp abstract ideas.
- Technology integration (purposeful)
- Using technology to enable active, higher-order work — not passive consumption.
- Pacing
- Adjusting the speed of instruction to keep students engaged and appropriately challenged.
- Lesson closure
- A wrap-up that has students summarize learning and connect it to the objective.
- Reteaching
- Presenting content again in a different way after assessment shows it didn't stick.
- Spiral curriculum (Bruner)
- Revisiting key concepts repeatedly at increasing depth over time.
- Scaffolded discussion
- Structured talk (sentence stems, roles) that supports all students in academic conversation.
- Wait time 2
- The pause a teacher allows after a student responds, before reacting, to deepen the answer.
- Mnemonic device
- A memory aid (acronym, rhyme) that helps students recall information.
- Activating prior knowledge
- Connecting new content to what students already know to improve comprehension.
- Cross-curricular / integrated instruction
- Connecting content across subjects so learning is more meaningful and transferable.
- Bloom's verbs for objectives
- Choosing the action verb that matches the intended cognitive level when writing an objective.
- Formative use within a lesson
- Checking for understanding mid-lesson (questioning, thumbs) and adjusting on the spot.
- Nonverbal communication
- Eye contact, proximity, and gestures that manage behavior and convey expectations.
- Formative assessment
- Ongoing, usually ungraded checking during instruction used to adjust teaching — assessment FOR learning.
- Summative assessment
- A measure of mastery after instruction (unit test, final project, state exam) — assessment OF learning.
- Diagnostic assessment
- Assessment given before instruction to identify students' prior knowledge and starting points.
- Exit ticket
- A brief, ungraded prompt at a lesson's end; a common formative check.
- Benchmark / interim assessment
- Periodic assessment that tracks progress toward end-of-year standards.
- Norm-referenced assessment
- Compares a student's performance to that of a representative peer group (percentiles).
- Criterion-referenced assessment
- Measures performance against a fixed standard or criterion, not against other students.
- Standardized test
- A test administered and scored under uniform conditions to allow comparison.
- Validity
- The degree to which an assessment measures what it is intended to measure.
- Content validity
- Whether a test's items adequately represent the content domain it claims to cover.
- Reliability
- The degree to which an assessment yields consistent results across administrations or scorers.
- Reliability vs. validity
- A test can be reliable without being valid, but cannot be truly valid without reliability.
- Test bias
- Features of an item that unfairly advantage or disadvantage a group unrelated to the skill measured.
- Authentic assessment
- Assessment requiring real-world application of skills (a performance, product, or task).
- Performance assessment
- Evaluating a skill by having students perform it (an experiment, a speech, a project).
- Portfolio assessment
- A purposeful collection of student work over time showing growth and achievement.
- Rubric
- A scoring guide listing criteria and performance levels; improves reliability and clarifies expectations.
- Analytic rubric
- Scores several dimensions of work separately (e.g., ideas, organization, conventions).
- Holistic rubric
- Gives a single overall score based on general impression against criteria.
- Checklist (assessment)
- A list of criteria marked present or absent; useful for procedural or behavioral tasks.
- Selected-response item
- A question with provided options (multiple choice, true/false, matching).
- Constructed-response item
- A question requiring students to generate an answer (short answer, essay, performance).
- Self-assessment
- Students evaluate their own work against criteria, building metacognition.
- Peer assessment
- Students evaluate one another's work using shared criteria.
- Effective feedback
- Specific, timely feedback focused on the task and next steps, not just a grade.
- Descriptive vs. evaluative feedback
- Descriptive tells what to improve and how; evaluative only judges ('good job').
- Praise for effort vs. ability
- Praising effort and strategy fosters a growth mindset; praising fixed ability undermines persistence.
- Assessment accommodation
- A change in how a student takes a test (extended time, read-aloud) that keeps the construct intact.
- Assessment modification
- A change in what is assessed (fewer items, different standard); alters the construct measured.
- Data-driven instruction
- Using assessment results to plan re-teaching, grouping, and the next lesson.
- Item analysis
- Reviewing how students performed on each item to judge difficulty, discrimination, and clarity.
- Grading vs. assessment
- Assessment gathers evidence of learning; grading summarizes it into a reported mark.
- Mastery / standards-based grading
- Reporting achievement against specific learning standards rather than a single averaged grade.
- Pretest / posttest
- Comparing performance before and after instruction to measure growth.
- Observation (assessment)
- Systematically watching and recording student behavior or skill as evidence of learning.
- Running record
- A method of recording a student's oral reading to assess accuracy and strategies.
- Anecdotal records
- Brief written observations of student behavior collected over time.
- Backward-mapped assessment
- Designing the assessment from the objective first so it measures the intended learning.
- Test-taking accommodations for ELLs
- Supports (bilingual dictionary, extra time) that let an ELL show content knowledge.
- Reliability of rubrics
- Clear, well-defined criteria raise consistency across different scorers.
- Reflective practice
- Analyzing one's own teaching and its effects in order to improve, often via journaling or peer observation.
- Action research
- A teacher's systematic inquiry into their own practice to solve a classroom problem.
- Professional development (PD)
- Ongoing learning (workshops, courses, coaching) that improves a teacher's knowledge and skills.
- Mentoring
- Pairing a new teacher with an experienced colleague for guidance and support.
- Professional learning community (PLC)
- A group of educators who collaborate regularly to improve teaching and student learning.
- Collaboration with colleagues
- Working with co-teachers, specialists, and staff to support student learning.
- Co-teaching
- Two teachers (often general and special education) sharing instruction of one class.
- IDEA
- The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act — guarantees a free appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment.
- FAPE
- Free Appropriate Public Education — a right guaranteed to students with disabilities under IDEA.
- Least restrictive environment (LRE)
- The IDEA requirement to educate students with disabilities with non-disabled peers to the greatest extent appropriate.
- IEP
- Individualized Education Program — the legal plan of specialized instruction and services for a student with a disability.
- IEP team
- The group (parents, teachers, specialists, administrator) that develops and reviews a student's IEP.
- Section 504
- A civil-rights law providing accommodations so students with disabilities can access education equally.
- 504 plan
- A plan of accommodations (not specialized instruction) for a student with a disability under Section 504.
- Response to Intervention (RTI)
- A tiered framework providing increasing levels of support and monitoring before a special-education referral.
- Inclusion
- Educating students with disabilities in the general classroom with appropriate supports.
- FERPA
- The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act — protects the privacy of student education records.
- Need-to-know (FERPA)
- Student records may be shared only with those who have a legitimate educational interest.
- Title IX
- Federal law prohibiting sex-based discrimination in education programs receiving federal funds.
- Mandatory reporter
- A teacher's legal duty to report suspected child abuse or neglect to authorities.
- Due process
- Procedural protections (notice, hearing) for students and parents in disciplinary or special-education decisions.
- Confidentiality
- Keeping student information private and sharing it only as legally and professionally appropriate.
- Professional ethics
- Standards of honest, fair, and responsible conduct toward students, families, and colleagues.
- Professional judgment
- Making sound instructional and ethical decisions within school and legal expectations.
- Two-way communication with families
- Regular, reciprocal contact that shares strengths and concerns and invites family input.
- Proactive parent contact
- Reaching out with positive news and updates, not only when problems arise.
- Parent-teacher conference
- A scheduled meeting to discuss a student's progress, strengths, and goals with families.
- Family engagement
- Involving families as partners in their child's education through communication and participation.
- Accommodating language needs
- Providing translation or interpreters so families with limited English can participate fully.
- Community resources
- School and community supports (counselors, social services, after-school programs) a teacher can connect families to.
- School support staff
- Counselors, psychologists, social workers, and specialists who support students and teachers.
- Advocacy for students
- Acting in students' best interests, including connecting them to needed services and supports.
- Confidential records sharing
- Releasing student data only to authorized parties with a legitimate educational need (FERPA).
- Continuing education / licensure renewal
- Ongoing coursework and PD required to maintain a teaching license.
- Self-evaluation
- A teacher reflecting on their own performance against professional standards to set growth goals.
- Peer observation
- Observing colleagues (and being observed) to share strategies and improve practice.
- Cultural sensitivity with families
- Respecting families' cultural values and communication norms when partnering with them.
- Confidentiality with colleagues
- Discussing student information with colleagues only when there is a legitimate educational purpose.
- Professional boundaries
- Maintaining appropriate, ethical relationships with students and families.
- Lifelong learning disposition
- A teacher's commitment to continually growing professionally throughout a career.