Abilities
I talked about what we know and what we can learn to do but there is another facet of the human condition called abilities. In the last post, I talked about how skills are learnable things we can do such as playing a musical instrument or solving mathematical story problems. But, we shouldn’t ignore the things we can do more naturally.
Bedrock recently posted a video talking about the various categories of abilities we have.
Let’s think about Kindergarten teachers. Of course they all attended schooling and training programs to build the knowledge and develop certain skills necessary to teach successfully.
Knowledge
Education and Training — Knowledge of principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.
English Language — Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
Psychology — Knowledge of human behavior and performance; individual differences in ability, personality, and interests; learning and motivation; psychological research methods; and the assessment and treatment of behavioral and affective disorders.
Mathematics — Knowledge of arithmetic, algebra, geometry, calculus, statistics, and their applications.
Customer and Personal Service — Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
Skills
Instructing — Teaching others how to do something.
Social Perceptiveness — Being aware of others' reactions and understanding why they react as they do.
Active Listening — Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
Learning Strategies — Selecting and using training/instructional methods and procedures appropriate for the situation when learning or teaching new things.
Monitoring — Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
However, what kinds of natural abilities to Kindergarten teachers tend to have most? Knowing this helps us frame our curriculum in a way they may be most receptive to. It may help us know more about what kinds of abilities we can leverage to develop the knowledge and skill they need.
According to ONET, Kindergartener Teachers have natural abilities in,
Oral Expression — The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
Written Comprehension — The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
Oral Comprehension — The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
Problem Sensitivity — The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
Speech Clarity — The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
The question of whether people are naturally born with these abilities or just have an attitude where they naturally want to learn them isn’t really important. The key here is that many Kindergartener teachers often excel in these areas. We could consider using their abilities for Oral Expression to do teach-backs in training programs. We could leverage their problem sensitivity to work on case studies and come up with plans of how to work with challenging children.
Knowing this offers some good insight into how this learner audience may behave in most situations.