Affective Domain
Erikson characterizes the years when children are in the primary grades as those when they are highly motivated psychologically to be industrious but also extremely vulnerable to feelings of inferiority. The primary school curriculum should therefore provide for an individualized approach that encourages children to use their energy and motivation to become fully engaged in learning and experience success and feelings of competence. A good primary curriculum promotes acceptance and respect for social, cultural, and intellectual differences. It is also flexible, allowing for in-depth investigations of topics that interest and engage children rather than surface learning of facts and concepts unrelated to children’s prior experiences. Learning centers as well as individual and small-group times should also be emphasized, rather than large-group instruction.
The years from kindergarten to grade 3 are also a time when children are passionately involved in making and maintaining friendships. They do this on a much more sophisticated level than preschoolers, who are just taking their first tentative steps into the social world. Compliments and insults, real or imagined, affect primary school children deeply, as they are losing their egocentric perspective and really beginning to develop empathy, compassion, and concern for others (along with parallel negative feelings of envy, jealousy, and rejection). Their strong need for belonging lends itself to a curriculum that fosters collaboration, cooperation, and working in pairs and small groups.