The Dynamic Interaction of Culture, Biology, and Context
The different levels of environment surrounding a child have an influence and impact in the child’s development.
There are different forces that help shape learning over the life span of an individual.
Human development, from birth throughout life, takes place through processes of interactions between the individual and that individual’s immediate physical and social environments. Through these dynamic interactions, culture influences even the biological aspects of learning.
In the 1970s, Urie Bronfenbrenner offered a formal model to illustrate the complex and diverse influences of context on the development of individuals. This model is known as the Urie Bronfenbrenner Ecological Theory which consists of a set of concentric rings representing the different systems in which the individual develops, moving from family, school, peer groups, and workplaces outward to broader social and institutional settings, ideologies, value systems, laws, and customs.
Bronfenbrenner believed that a person's development was affected by everything in their surrounding environment. He divided the person's environment into five different levels: the microsystem, the mesosystem, the exosystem, the macrosystem, and the chronosystem.
URIE BRONFENBRENNER
ECOLOGICAL THEORY
It is important for educators to understand the importance of building a fundamental relationship with students. The microsystem is where the most direct interactions between the child and the educators take place. In other words, the microsystems (teachers) have a direct influence on the child's development.
The biology of the brain provides the physiological platform for learning and is shaped by the social and cultural influences outside of the individual.
Culture coordinates the biological systems involved in learning and is the broader social context in which people engage in the experiences that enable them to adapt to the world and learn.