Case Analysis: Im Not Who You See

Chaoran Yao
CEP 891, Summer 2011

CASE DESCRIPTION Anna is a four year old adopted girl in Mrs. Ys Saturday Chinese school, which consisted adopted children from China and biracial children. All of them are girls. Anna had difficulty in concentrating in class, as a result, she could not learn. She told the teacher that she did not like Chinese and began to be absent. Mrs. Y then visited her parents and got to know about her growth environment. Anna was very anxious attending the Chinese class. She was scared of the other classmates, who were all Asian girls and especially Mrs. Y for her Asian face. She felt heavy pressure when asked to answer questions and felt stupid and low if she could not answer it right. Mrs. Y never saw her anxiety because Anna never showed her anxiety in class. Anna only showed her anxiety in front of her adoptive parents. Before adopted, Anna lived in an orphanage with other 12 adopted girls. There was only 1 nanny taking care of all these girls. She always had nightmare after adopted and was scared to be taken away from her adoptive parents. It took her for a while to accept her other sister and brother to hug her mother. After this family visiting, Mrs. Y suggested that Anna may stop coming to the class if she felt uncomfortable. However, when Anna began attending kindergarten, she could not focus, neither. All of her anxiety was only revealed to her parents. She could not feel good about herself, no matter how much her parents encouraged her. THE REASON THAT I CHOOSE THIS CASE Firstly, I was impressed by I do not like Chinese at the first glance. Last year when I first taught, I encountered this situation. I wanted to analyze the reason for not liking Chinese, so that I can do something to make a change. After I did some survey last year, I found out that there are many reasons that students not interested in learning (Chinese), such as having difficulty in learning the four tones and characters, feeling hard to remember the vocabulary, or I just dont like language etc. All of them were related to academic performance. However, Annas case needs to be taken in an emotional perspective. Secondly, when it comes to the kids learning difficulty, its easy to connect it to students multiply intelligences. As for misbehavior, it could possibly be ADHD. However in this case, Annas reluctant of learning is caused by her emotion, which made this case unique and could help me to think about relevant other cases. Thirdly, the teacher in this case did some intervention- visiting the students family. This is something we as teachers could learn from. Learners are not alone in the learning environment, but the community is involved. Mrs. Ys action reminds me that when the kids show the difficulty or misbehavior in class, its important to know what happened, and its even more important to know why it happened. However, this intervention did not really help this child at last. I wonder why.

HYPOTHESIS Firstly, Annas anxiety in Chinese classroom and even regular classroom is the assimilation of her orphan experience. It dated back to her first eleven months after her birth. Anna lived with Chinese girls and a Chinese nanny before adopted. The Chinese classroom was very similar to Anna. Other students were girls and mostly adopted. Mrs. Y played a role as a nanny, with a Chinese face. In class, they learn and speak Chinese. All of these brought out her bad memory about her experience in the orphanage. This explains why Anna did not like Chinese and was very scared about other girls and Mrs. Y. Secondly, Annas cover of her anxiety is because of lack of encouraging. She does not feel safe in the classroom environment, especially when its similar to her early eleven months. When Anna expressed her anxiety in front of the parents, she could get positive reinforcement by comforting. In her other experience, she may get punishment, like telling her that there was monster if she did such things. As a result, she learned to hind her real feelings to avoid bad things. Before the age of one, her demand for food and changing the diaper may not be fully satisfied. Therefore, her fixation leads to development of oral traits, such as depression and the feel of insecurity. (Freud, p12) Its a crucial year after her birth. During this time, child began to develop trust or mistrust the key caregivers, primarily the mother, and the environment. Its desirable for the infant to connect its environment with inner feeings of satisfaction and contentment. (Erikson, p12) Sadly, in Annas case, she was led to mistrust. Thirdly, Annas pressure from peers and answering questions came from the sense of insecure and doubt. She always questioned herself and felt incapable to do certain things. Anna was four years old in the case. Her first year was in an orphanage and then she met her adopted parents, together with her big sister and brother. This is the period to develop autonomy or shame and doubt. (Erikson, p12) Apparently, she developed more doubt instead of autonomy. WHAT WOULD I DO AS A TEACHER Teachers cannot intervene the students past experience. And I cannot change the fact that her classmates would be Chinese girls and Im also a Chinese. But I need to distinguish my class as a welcome and safe place. Since Annas dislike is resulted from her anxiety toward the classroom environment, I would take initiatives as follows: Firstly, pay attention to her in class. If she raised her hand, call her. I will first set up a rule that the whole class need to applaud on others answers. If she answers it right, the rest of us will applaud for her. I believe that praise from peers is powerful, which helps to build her confidence and reduce her doubt. When other students say something wrong, I tell the class that its ok to say it not right, but its super to have a nice try. I may use smile, oral praise, applaud, movies and other benefits to encourage all of them to raise the hands to participate. When it comes to Anna, I wont miss that.

Secondly, help her to make friends with other girls and think about what she can do and assign classroom jobs for her. Anna need to do something to reduce her uncertainty. There is no better way to let her to do what she can do to achieve this. Also, in this way, she will get involved in the classroom environment, which makes her feel safe. Also, I will give her chances to make choices by herself. Sometimes academically, but first it will be Annas life related. In this way, she will have a feel that something is under control. Thirdly, encourage her to express her anxiety in school. Let everyone know that its ok to express our unhappy feelings. I may tell them first what I am scared about, and then let the students to share what they are afraid of. I will set up two board, one is for risk- taker who take risks to tell us things they are afraid of; the other is put down the things that they are afraid of. Make it obvious that its ok to feel scared and its good to express it out. This is not end there. I would let the students to think about what we can do if we are scared of something and how we can be helpful if we see someone feels scared. Fourthly, keep in close touch with her parents. On the one hand, itll help me to keep track of how things go in school and at home. Then I can make adjustment to reinforce it or change other ways. On the other hand, it shows a close relationship with her parents to Anna. If Anna feels her teacher is close to her parents, she may feel more intimate with the teacher. It then helps to let Anna feel safe. But there is one thing I need to notice that we should keep the communication obvious to Anna, letting her know we are not talking about getting you away.

Week 2 Discussion Based on the Theme: Familial Relationship and Influences, including Influences on Development: Parents, Siblings, and Peers, The Family, and Relationships with Parents. This weeks reading talked about family influences in the childrens early childhood, middle childhood and adolescence. Here in Annas case, she was experiencing her early childhood with her adoptive parents in the Chinese class. Im going to analyze her case in this view of point. Its unique that the story did not end there. Annas regular class in kindergarten seemed to be tough, too. So Im going to work on her middle childhood as well and try to find out something helpful. HYPOTHESIS: On the one hand, Annas good behavior, such as helping others came from her warm family environment. The adoptive parents are warm parents, who are caring and supportive of Anna. In result, Anna showed active, inquisitive and outgoing personalities in both schools. Besides, Annas big sister and brother were grown-ups when she was adopted. Somehow, she was reared as a later-born child and even got full attention from her parents. This led to her compliance and sweetness. Annas parents are permissive, which is connected with higher self-esteem and

adjustment compared with other parenting styles (Martinez et al., 2003) When Anna felt less smart than her peers, its a demonstration of self-esteem that want to be good. She adjusted herself well as an adopted child. However, one the other hand, it is the same reason, the parents way to take care of her, that caused Annas low interest in learning. According to Baumrinds four parenting style, this couple were permissive-indulgent parents. Considering her anxiety in school, the parents may set up a low expectation on her academic achievement. The parents knew about her past and wanted to give whatever she wanted as long as she was happy. When Anna felt anxious in the Chinese class (preschool), the parents would withdraw her out of it. I can understand this. However, when Anna went to regular school (kindergarten), the assimilation (please see my week 1 discussion) was highly declined. In this situation, Anna did not have interest in learning, neither. Part of the reason may be resulted from the teachers instruction, but I begin to doubt the parents help in this process. Did they have a high expectation of Annas learning? Im afraid not. Lastly, her feeling of insecurity may result in her disability of concentrating, which may be resulted from her social incompetency. Anna had two sister and brother, both of which were grown-ups. I assume that they tended to indulge the little kid, instead of fighting with her, just like their parents. Siblings make a unique contribution to one anothers social, emotional and cognitive development. (Spencer, 2003) At this point, Anna did not gain social communication skills with her siblings. Anna likes to helping others in this case. It did not tell me that she liked to play and talk with her peers. (Maybe she did, but was not reflected in the case.) Her safe life seemed to be only around her parents, especially her mom. But only when she worked with her peers more could she learn to communicate and deal with her emotions better. POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS: Im not the parents anyway and I cannot substitute for the parents in any meaning. The following solutions are something I may work with the parents, though parent-visiting, email, and phone call, for Annas growth. 1. Work with the parents to set up a higher expectation academically. As permissiveindulgence parents, they rated low in their attempts to control their children and in their demands for mature behavior. (Spencer, 2003) Parents are too relaxed in rearing this child. Its good to build up a safe environment at home, but for Annas academic growth, they need to be more demanding. In this procedure, the parents may use the inductive techniques, giving reasons about why we go to school and why school is safe and could be enjoyable. Make it obvious, like telling Anna that schooling cared about her growth. Considering Annas attachment to her parents, the parents attitude toward schooling will affected strongly on her. At least, she will try to focus. 2. Give Anna choices to help her to control herself. Anna was going to her middle childhood after her kindergarten. She is coming to a coregulation period (Maccogy,2002;

Wahler et al.,2001), which Anna will learn self-control. Enpowering Anna with choices is a way to let her take responsibility to manage her own life and learn to keep balanced. In this way, Anna gains autonomy and initiative (Erikson) and learns to be more mature and confident. 3. Help her to social with others to enhance the sense of security in class. Interaction with her peers will let her understand that its common to feel anxious sometimes. Like in week 1, I will lead discussion about this. But I wont always focus on the special need. I believe the regular interaction will release her anxiety and be helpful gradually. Thus, I will design more group work and team work, which the students need to cooperate with each other. It will contribute to Annas social, emotional and cognitive development through negotiation with each other. 4. Parents continue to give emotional support, just as they always did. Throughout middle childhood, children rate their parents as their best source of emotional support, rating them more highly than friends (Cowan& Cowan, 2005; Katz et al., 2005). While encourage Anna to take risks in high academic achievement, making her own choices and engaging in peer interaction, Anna need emotional support from someone she strongly trusted, her parents. Anna may encounter many uncertainty and setbacks, the parents should always be there and encourage her to keep trying by verbal and non-verbal reinforcement, such as praise, smiles and hugs. 5. Lastly, bring her out, like travelling and visiting relatives, to see the world around her. This is not very related to the reading materials, but my personal belief. On the one hand, it helps her to understand better about things around her. If she is familiar with her living environment, she can locate herself better, and feel safe in a sense of controlling. On the other hand, being exposed to something unfamiliar helps her to forge more curiosity around her, which leads her desire to explore in school. Week3 Discussion Based on the Theme: Friends, Peers and Social Networks, including Peer Relationships, and Relationships with Parents and Peers. I have read about childrens development, family influence and peer influence so far. Every time when I have the new reading materials, I rethink about my case in another angle, which is required in the syllabus. Sometimes, the hypothesis is overlapped one another while sometimes, it seems to have little relevant with the current theory. As a result, I may re-emphasize the point that I mentioned before, and I will also dig out the hidden reason related to the current reading materials that may not be obviously shown in the case description. But I want to dig out in depth by using the current reading materials. As a result, I will just focus my case on peer influence instead of others. The following hypothesis are in sequence. The first hypothesis is superficial while the second one is a little bit in depth, and the third one is the root of the first and second one.

HYPOTHESIS: To start with, Anna did not have a safe feeling from her peers. Anna never showed her anxiety in front of the teachers. Peers provide emotional support (Dishion& Stormshak, 2007; Grusec, 2006). Anna knew that it was acceptable to reveal her true feelings in front of her parents because she could get comfort and care from them. Its not common that kids have so many anxious situations. So Anna was not sure about how her peers would react if she showed too much anxiety in classroom. Whats worse, she might be considered unusual when she once showed her anxiety. Thus, to earn peer acceptance instead of rejection, she only showed her smiling face. Secondly, Anna wanted to gain acceptance from peers, but lacked peer interaction. Acceptance or rejection by peers is of major importance in childhood because problems with peers affect adjustment latter on (Wentzel et al., 2004). According to Piaget, child in her pre-operational stage (Anna) assumes the others see situations from her viewpoint. She was outgoing and helping in the class. However, she did not know how to deal with problems when conflicts and emotional pressure merged. Children develop social skills-sharing, helping, taking turns, dealing with conflict- in the peer group. Cognitive skills develop through peer interactions (Dishion& Stormshak, 2007; Grusec, 2006). As I mentioned in week 2, Annas siblings were a lot older than her, from whom she did not learn to deal with conflicts. Her play life was around her parents and did not play in her neighborhood playground, which should be included in her microsystem. Last but not least, Anna lacked social skills. Popular children also tend to succeed academically (Chen et al., 2001). Popular children are friendly, mature, cooperative, helpful, and socially skillful (Chen et al., 2001; Xie et al., 2006). Annas lack of social skills let her to have less peer interaction, which in return, makes her less socially skilled. If she can participate more in peer interaction, probably she will has more motivation in learning with her peers. POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS: 1. Encourage more peer support. Teachers need to treat everyone fair. But different kids have different needs, it becomes unfair to treat everybody the same way. (Weinstein & Mignano, 2006) Annas special need is to have the classmates understand and accept her anxiety. I may lead a share circle without Annas present, then we discuss about her sense of insecurity in classroom. I will inspire them how each of them can do to help her to release the sense of anxiety. Children remain egocentric and unable to take one anothers point of view during their pre-operational stage (Selman, 1980). So I will encourage my kids to understand and support her when she encountered emotional difficulty. I believe more encouragement, approval and acceptance from peers will increase her self-esteem and self-confidence. 2. Arrange for classroom jobs. Involving Anna more in the classroom activity will give her more opportunity to interact with her peers. Peer interaction will help her to develop the

social skillshelping, cooperating, sharing and dealing with conflicts and emotional problems. Also, such privilege jobs will enhance her popularity and acceptance. This will increase her sense of belongs to the classroom and motivate her to participate more in the classroom activities, such as academic learning. 3. Seat Anna next to an academically high girl who is also helping and outgoing. Helping her to develop a friendship will enhance her social skills and release her anxiety. In the preschool years and early years of middle childhood, friendships are based on geographic closeness or proximity (Rathus, 2008). The similarity and nice personalities will bind them together easily. This is also why I choose someone similar to Anna to be her partner. At the same time, a good example academically will help her in learning and motivate her learning as well. Moreover, when she seat with a helping and outgoing students, both of them will get enhanced in their charm and popularity among peers. 4. Enhance her social skills by games and group works. Sometimes, the kids are born to be socially skillful. But training in social skills seems to help increase childrens popularity (Cashwell et al., 2001; Webster-Stratton et al., 2001b). Games, role-plays, models and group works are the useful ways to enhance the kids social skills. Through games and group work, she will learn how to socialize by herself. Meanwhile, the kids spend most of their awake time in school. Through modeling and role-play, the students are exposed and think about how to deal with conflicts and emotional ill-at-ease. The microsystem and mesosystem influence and interaction will improve Anna in imitating and solving her own problems.

Week 4 Discussion Based on the theme: Gender Differences, including Development of Gender Roles and Sex Differences, and Sexuality. Anna was a nice, active girl, who liked to help others. She was easy to get nervous and feel bad about herself. One contribute is her gender identity. Im going to explore her issue in the aspect her gender as girl. HYPOTHESIS First of all, girls stereotype leads to Annas pleasant personality. The feminine gender-role stereotype includes such traits as dependence, gentleness, helpfulness, warmth, emotionality, submissiveness, and home orientation (Miller et al., 2006). At age 2, children develop the gender identity (Campbell et al., 2004; Ruble et al., 2006). Gender identity can inspire genderappropriate behavior (Ruble et al., 2006). A girl may be gentle and kind because that is expected of girls (Rathus, 2008). In this case, Anna was nice, sweet and willing to help others. She well demonstrated her girl identity with very pleasant personality as a girl.

Then, Annas activity also demonstrates for the girl identity. Between the ages of 3 and 9 or 10, children become increasingly traditional in their stereotyping of activities, occupational roles, and personality traits (Miller et al., 2006). By age 3, they display knowledge of gender stereotypes for toys, clothing, work, and activities (Campbell et al., 2004). Anna liked to play skits with her mother. She took her big sister as an idol. She liked to paint her fingernails and make up with her sister. She imitated the older female in her familymother and sister. Whats more, Anna catered for the expectation of gender identity. Socialization plays a role in gender typing. Parents, teachers, other adultseven other childrenprovide children with information about the gender-typed behaviors they are expected to display (Sabattini & Leaper, 2004). For example, fathers tend to encourage their daughters to develop warm, nurturant behavior (Rathus, 2008). Both her personality and behaviors at home and at school agreed with the stereotyped gender expectations. She was old enough to identify what kind of behavior is expected for girls. According to her parents, she was very afraid to be given away. To avoid that situation, she learned to behave as expected. In another word, she catered for the stereotyped expectation as a girl. Last but not least, girls are more likely to feel afraid and be emotional. Traits such as often is afraid are seen as feminine (Rathus, 2008). Anna was 4 years old preschooler when she took the Chinese school. At this age, kids have already developed their gender identity and move to gender stability. Showing distress apparently becomes gender typed so that preschoolers judge it to be acceptable for girls (Watler & LaFreniere, 2000). The kids feel it is acceptable for Annas behavior, such as when she looked for parents for help when she felt stressful, because it is just shown for feminine. The feminine gender-role stereotype also includes emotionality and submissiveness (Miller et al., 2006). Anna was usually frustrated, upset and nervous. This explains why she could be outgoing, happy, but then turn to be sad and upset. POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS To cope with her anxiety and distraction in learning, I recommend her to develop a masculine personality. Some psychologists suggest that it is worthwhile to promote psychological androgyny in children because they will then pass both the feminine and masculine traits that are valued in the culture (Rathus, 2008). The term of psychologically androgyny refers to People with both stereotypical feminine and masculine traits (Rathus, 2008). A good deal of evidence suggests that androgynous children and adolescents are relatively will adjusted, apparently because they can summon a wider range of traits to meet the challenges in their lives (Lefkowitz& Zeldow, 2006). Androgynous children and adolescents have better social relations, superior adjustment, greater creativity (Norlandr et al., 2000). Anna demonstrated a bunch of feminine traits, which help her to be accepted by family members and peers. However, too much feminine also hindered her in learning. As a result, Im going to help her to be a little more masculine, so that she will develop the courage to take risks in learning. Please see the following tips for detailed strategy.

1. Help Anna to get a chance to be a leader. It could be the captain or team leader of her team. 2. Help Anna to be more competitive and confident, such as giving rewards. Anna could be rewarded as Star of the Month (for being caring), Queen of Handwriting, or Princess of Math. 3. Encourage her to participate in sports, such as swim, running, and dancing. 4. Help him to interact more with boys. Boys think things differently. Peers will affect ones behavior in some way. The father could be a good model as a male.

Week 5 Discussion Based on the theme: Personality, Self-concept and Social Cognition, including Personality and Emotional Development, Theories of Social and Emotional Development in Middle Childhood, and Development of Identity and the Self-Concept: Who am I. This weeks reading discussed about the childrens personality and emotional development. Personality and emotional development does not happen by themselves. The peer impact, parenting and gender difference serve as influential factors in forming the kids. Considering the age of the girl in my case, Im going to apply the theories of Chapter 10, including self, initiative versus guilt, and fears: the horrors of early childhood, to discuss her issue. HYPOTHESIS: Anna has low self- esteem and low sense of security. Children who have a good opinion of themselves during the preschool years are more likely to show secure attachment and have parents who are attentive to their needs (Booth-LaForce et al., 2006; Patterson &Bigler, 2006). In Annas preschool school year, she developed her sense of self, especially categorical self. For example, she already knew that she was a girl and she was different from her mother, which she cared about a lot and was very disappointed in. Whats more, as a preschooler, she did not have a satisfactory academic achievement. As a result, she did not obtain certain secure attachment, though she had parents attentive to her needs. However, on the other side, Anna has the fear of letting others down, which leads to her introconflicts and upset her a lot. Preschool children begin to make evaluative judgments about two different aspects of themselves by the age of 4 (Harter & Piek, 1984). One is their cognitive and physical competence, and the second is their social acceptance by peers and parents (Clark & Symons, 2004; Piek et al., 2006). The previous hypothesis is mainly about the first aspects of Annas evaluative judgment. The second one upsets her by fear of letting the peers and parents down. Anna is not confident about her competence. Consequently, she was always not sure about her answers in class. She did not want anyone to know that she was academically incapable, so

she felts very nervous when she was called on. This became a vicious circle, the less she want to participate, the more mistakes she might make, the less confident she became. Thinking about Ericksons theory, Anna has more guilt than initiative in learning, which results in her low expectation towards her academic achievements. This talked about the similar problem with the second hypothesis, but in different aspect. As preschool children continue to develop a separate sense of themselves, they increasingly move out into the world and take the initiative in learning new skills, which was labeled as the stage of initiative versus guilt (Erikson, 1963). During this period, the parents focused more on Annas emotional behavior. They did what they could to eliminate the girls anxiety, such as taking her to psychiatrist, sleeping with the girl, acquiescent to her willing not to attend school. Anna did not have enough motivation in taking risks in learning. She has low academic expectation as their parents. Lastly, Annas fear of monsters and darkness is not unusual due to her age and gender. Its not a typical issue that kids in Annas age, especially for girls, are afraid of imaginary creatures. Both the frequency and the content of fears change as children move from infancy into the preschool years. The number of fears peak between 2.5 and 4 years and then taper off (Miller et al., 1990b). Preschoolers are most likely to have fears that revolve around animals, imaginary creatures, the dark, and personal safety (Field, 2006; Muris et al., 2003). Whats more, girls report more fears and higher levels of anxiety than boys (.Ollendick et al., 1991; Weems et al., 1999). POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS: Annas problem relies heavily on her emotion. She needs high self-esteem about herself and motivations in learning. As a result, I suggest: 1. Teacher and parents help to enhance Annas self-esteem. Im not going to list the detailed steps one by one, please see my case discussion: Week 4 and 3, Solutions. 2. Parents set high expectation in Annas academic development. Please see my case discussion: Week 2, Solution 1. 3. To overcome her fear of monsters and darkness and even the fear of participating in classroom, participant modeling and operant conditioning can be helpful. 4. Participant modeling helps children overcome fears through principles of observational learning. Children first observe live models or filmed or taped models engaged in the behavior that evokes fear. Then they imitate the behavior of the models (Spencer, 2008). One the one hand, parents may use monster videos to illustrate that the monsters are not horrible. On the other hand, the parents could always tell Anna that there were no monsters in the real world. 5. Apply operant conditioning: In using behavior modification in the classroom, good behavior is reinforced and misbehavior is ignored (Spencer, 2008). Teachers use this strategy a lot. Specifically, Anna needs reinforcement for her good behaviors, such as volunteering in answering questions and participating vigorously. Teachers can use smile,

oral encouragement, chances to get the classroom jobs, more free time, being the little teacher to encourage her in doing these again.

References: 1) Abedi, A. (2011). Male vs. Female Brains - Brain Differences and What We Can Learn from Them. Retrieved July 11, 2011, retrieved fromhttp://www.squidoo.com/malefemalebrain 2) Carole Simon Weinstein & Andrew J. Mignano, JR. Elementary Classroom ManagementLesson from Research and Practice, 4th Edition, 2006, McGraw-Hill higher Education 3) Carole Simon Weinstein & Andrew J. Mignano, JR. Elementary Classroom ManagementLesson from Research and Practice, 4th Edition, McGraw-Hill higher Education 4) Helium: How to Help Preschoolers Develop Social Skills http://www.helium.com/knowledge/181968-how-to-help-preschoolers-develop-socialskills 5) Rathus, S. A. (2008). Childhood and Adolescence Voyages in Development. (3rd ed). New York: New York University 6) Schimelpfening, N. (2010). Depression in Children. Retrieved July 29, 2011, from http://depression.about.com/od/childhood/a/signssymptoms.htm.