A teacher needs to become thoroughly familiar with the age-level characteristics of students to be taught. Developmental psychology books and magazines, parents' magazines, general educational magazines and teachers' manuals at a given grade level can provide such information. It is helpful to note and write down those characteristics that will affect the teaching of a specific lesson. Consider the following list.

Physical Characteristics

Bone and muscle development - (Example - Children of level do not have sufficiently developed bone and muscle structure to do the fine motor task for so I will provide instead.)

Height

Weight

Vision - (Example - At the age level the child's eyes have difficulty moving from focusing on distant objects to moving back to near objects. Therefore, when extensive copying from the board is involved, I will provide a desk copy for less mature children.

Hearing

Moral Development

(Consider the research of Kohlberg and Piaget.)

Development of Religious Concepts

(Teachers' manuals for religious curriculum materials, methods books for religious education and professional magazines are possible sources.)

Ronald Goldman has written a book about religious thinking which may also be consulted.

Goldman, Ronald. (1964). Religious Thinking from Childhood to Adolescence. New York. The Seabury Press.

Abilities in Content Areas

1. Handwriting - (Example - Children of this age can write about twenty-five letters per minute. Therefore I need to allot minutes to complete this assignment.)

2. Mathematics - (Example - The children can use long division to solve problems which will be encountered in the economic simulation)

3. Art - (Example - Children of this age understand the relation of symbols to abstract ideas and therefore will be able to draw a picture to match content read.)

4. Reading ; 5. Writing; 6. Speaking; 7. Spelling; 8. Music; 9. Physical Education; 10. Science; 11. Health and Safety;

12. Literature; 13. Social Studies

Thinking Capabilities - (Consult learning theorists.)

(Example - Metacognitive skills have reached the stage of . Therefore children can engage in a discussion of thinking about their own thinking.)

Psychological/Social/Emotional - (Consult psychology textbooks.)

(Example - Peer pressure at this age strongly influences choices. Therefore I will group by .)

Choose and list those characteristics which are most directly related to the activities which will be taking place in a lesson.