Question

Describe what psychologists mean when they say that attention and working memory have a limited capacity. Discuss at least two implications of this limited capacity for learning in the classroom.

Answer 1

Describe what psychologists mean when they say that attention and working memory have a limited capacity. Discuss at least two implications of this limited capacity for learning in the classroom.

Working memory is considered to have limited capacity, because it can only store things for a short time. These could be stored only in the chunks of 7 moreover, if the words are longer, the memory span is even lower. This implies that if the spoken words are more complecated phonologically, then the memory span for those words would be even difficult. Also, if the contents of the words spoken are more known to the person, they would be remembered in a better manner.

For students in classroom, it becomes difficult to remember the spoken words if a completely new chapter is taught. One of the examples is, teachers always ask students to pre- prepare for a class, since, that would help them remember better.

Secondly, while present in a seminar, it is always advised to take notes, especially of the more scientific contents. Because, even though students would be able to remember the explanation part or the simpler contexts, they tend to forget the name of the concept. This is because, it gets harder to remember words longer than seven letters.