Cognitive Development

An overview

• Piaget’s cognitive development theory• Stages of cognitive development and basic characteristics • Vygotsky’s socio-cultural perspective• Their Contribution to teaching and learning• Implications of cognitive developmental changes for teaching and learning

Objectives

• Categorize stages of cognitive development and its implications for teaching-learning.• Evaluate cognitive developmental theories of Piaget and Vygotsky.

Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory

Jean Piaget (1896-1980)

Piaget, a Swiss psychologist, described logical thinking and reasoning about complex

situations as the highest form of

cognitive development. He grounded his investigations in the individual child's manipulation and interaction with objects in his

or her particular environment.

The concept of cognitive structure is central to his theory.

Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

Key concepts

• The developing child’s rational thinking and stages of thought are emphasized.

• Thoughts are the central focus of development, the primary determinants of children’s actions.

Piaget stressed that children actively construct their worlds through two processes

Processes of construction

Organization Adaptation

Assimilation Accommodation (incorporate new info.) (adjust to new info.)

Equilibration

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

1. Sensorimotor Thought (birth – 2 years)

The infant is able to organize and coordinate sensations with

physical movements.

Characteristics:

• Children are egocentric. • Children begin to distinguish their actions as

causes (casuality).• They achieve object permanence. • Children are able to represent the world

through language.

What could be some implications for Teachers and Parents?

• Provide multiple objects of various sizes, shapes, and colours.

• Talk to children and be sensitively responsive to them. In general, anything can be the most exciting plaything an infant can experience.

2. Preoperational Thought (2 – 7 yrs. - Preschool)

A transition from primitive to more sophisticated use of symbols. The child does not yet think in an operational way.

Sub-stage of Preoperational Thought

Symbolic thoughtSymbolic function Intuitive thought(2 – 4 yrs.) (4 – 7 yrs.)

Egocentrism

Animism

Characteristics

• Centration/ Centering: It is most clearly evidenced in their lack of conservation

• Children begin to use symbols, such as language, but are not able to manipulate them.

• Transductive reasoning or reasoning from particular to particular in a non-logical manner • Irreversibility or inability to reverse their thinking • They are intuitive rather than logical at this stage.

• realism (ability to slowly distinguish and accept the real world)

• artificialism (assumption that everything is a product of human creation)

Implications for Teachers and Parents

• Provide opportunities for interactions with adults, other children, and materials as they learn through active explorations

• Encourage manipulation of materials, provide hands-on experiences, engage in activities such as:

(a) deferred imitation (imitating animals, activities etc. that are seen earlier)

(b) symbolic play (pretend play, e.g. pretending to sleep)

(c) drawing;

(d) role-plays, etc.

3. Concrete Operational Thought (7 – 11 yrs., middle & late childhood)

It is made up of operations, mental actions that are reversible. The child shows conservation and classification skills.

Characteristics:• Skill of Reversibility

• Classification skills

• Logical reasoning replaces intuitive thought

• Ability to understand the number concept (the meaning of numbers)

Implications for Teachers and Parents

• Children at this stage are capable of representational thought, but only with the concrete and or tangible. They cannot grasp abstract subtleties.

• It is a good idea to use classification games and activities.

4. Formal Operational Thought (11/12 plus, adolescence and beyond)

More abstract, idealistic and logical thinking appears at this stage. Piaget believed that adolescence become capable of using hypothetical-deductive reasoning.

Characteristics:

Adolescent egocentrism - manifested through:•Imaginary audience (belief that others are as preoccupied with them as they are)

•Personal fable (a sense of personal uniqueness and indestructibility).

Implications for Teachers and Parents

• Provide as many concrete examples before asking students to formulate general principles.

• Encourage discussions and reasoning.

• Remember many adolescents and adults never reach the stage of formal operations.

Vygotsky’s TheoryLev Vygotsky (1896-1934)

• argued that human development occurs in a socio-cultural context.

• zone of proximal development (ZPD)

• scaffolding

• language and thought develop independently and then merge.

Implications for teaching

• Use ZPD and scaffolding• Encourage use of private speech