Adolescents

In order to know how to teach to teenagers, it is necessary to know about them and see what we can do for them in the teaching field. It is interesting to see how the brain takes an important role in the developing thoughts of adolescents. How the brain structure works, tell us why adolescents behave the way they do and how they process the information received.  The corpus callusom, are nerves fibers which connect the brain´s two hemisphere, they thicken in adolescence to process information more effectively. (Giedd, 2008) The prefrontal cortex is related to intense emotions involving reasoning, decision making and self-control which does not finish developing until adult years. Added to this, the Amigdala is the seat of emotions like anger. This area matures much earlier than prefrontal cortex. Change that explains why teenagers get aggressive behavior during interaction with parents and sometimes with teachers. 

Knowing about Piaget and Vygotsky theories can lead us to know the factors in what teenagers get new information and construct from it new knowledge and take advantage of social interaction working with others in cooperative activities. On the other hand, teenager’s attention span is short not up to 15 minutes but as teachers we can guide students to allocate their attention using the different types of attention such as: selective attention, divided attention, sustained attention and executive attention. Now talking about executive functioning; making decisions, reasoning and critical thinking are part of it and during adolescence period they  are able to increase such functions because the cognitive changes as increased speed, capacity of information processing and construct new combination of knowledge are increasing. Guilford states that brainstorming and introducing adolescents to creative people can be used to stimulate creative thinking. 

The stereotype in society about gender is a factor to consider when teaching. Society has set many ideas about the roles male and female play, like: men are powerful and women are weak. Deborah Tannen (1990) says that boys and girls grow up in different worlds of talk – parents, siblings, teachers, etc. she pointed that the communication in relationships is important.  She established two types:  the rapport talk: a way to established and negotiating relationships. Females enjoy rapport talk.  And the Report talk: talk that gives information. Public speaking is an example of it. Boys like this type of talk.  But gender differences in communication often depend on the context like: group size, speaking with adults, and familiarity. 

In real context “in school” students experience many transitions to one grade to a higher one or vice versa. These transitions influence in students´ self-esteem, behavior and communication with others.  That is the importance for a classroom positive environment for learning.  Diana Baumrind (1971) gives two strategies to a positive environment. The authoritative strategy of classroom management (encourages students to be independent thinkers) and the authoritarian strategy of classroom management (restrictive and punitive).  These strategies can help us to make a good environment in class. Teachers must be aware of the way teens threat others in school (bullying) and know what to do with adolescents with learning disabilities like: ADHD or dyslexia. 

All these changes and challenges adolescents go through are helpful hints for teachers to be prepared to manage the classroom in an efficient way when teaching. So, students learn and remember useful things not for short period of time but for their whole life.