Cognitive Development

Intellectual Development (0-3 Years) Beginning to realise others are separate beings from themselves, imitates others and tries out ways of behaving in play, becoming more confident but still needs adult reassurance

During this stage, the child can engage in symbolic play, and have developed an imagination. This child may use an object to represent something else, such pretending that a broom is a horse. An important feature a child displays during this stage is egocentrism. This refers to the child’s inability to see a situation from another person’s point of view. To test whether or not children are egocentric, Piaget used the ‘Three Mountain Task’. Piaget concluded that the four-year olds thinking was egocentric, as the seven year olds was not. Children, at this stage, do not understand more complex concepts such as cause and effect, time, and comparison.

Physical development 0-3 years they are able to feed themselves at the snack table. Nod or shake their heads to say if they want something. If playing shops they should be able to push the trolley and walk at the same time. Be able to kick a ball independently. Showing control when pouring milk/water into a cup. Start making lines and circles when scribbles during mark making. Making bigger towers.

| By this age the child likes to begin to explore and they are able to respond to the simple directions that they are given, can group objects by category, are able to stack rings on pegs in the order of the size (big to small), able to recognize themselves when looking in the mirror and finally they still like imitating more complex adult actions for example housekeeping play.

Cognitive Development refers to the construction of the thought process that includes problem solving, remembering and the ability to make decisions, from childhood up to the adulthood stage. Cognitive/Intellectual Development is the ability to learn, reason, and analyze the fact that a process begins from infancy and progresses as the individual (Educational Psychology). Cognitive Development contains events that are logical, like thinking and remembering. Some factors remain the same throughout many of the theories on cognitive development. All theorists agree that people go through specific steps and/or

Can use blocks to create simple structures. Enjoys filling and emptying containers. Parallel play (plays near other children). Begins to talk while playing (pretend play). Will imitate adults actions.

Social/Cultural: In this stage the child develop a sense of self and a sense of belonging to a family. They begin interacting with other children and they also play in stages (playing alone, playing near others but not really playing with them, not wanting to share, playing and sharing, and playing with a purpose). This stage is also were the child also learn to respect the rights and feelings of others.

Children develop cognition through two main stages that Jean Piaget theorized. The stages run from birth and infancy to school age children. Sensorimotor is the first stage and goes from birth to about the age of two. This stage implies that the children learn about the environment they live in and they learn this through the reflexes and movements they produce. They also learn that they are separate people from their parents and they can say goodbye to them and know they will come back. The second stage is called the preoperational stage. During this stage of development, children will learn how to incorporate symbols to represent objects. This is also the beginning of learning the alphabet and speech. The child is still very much egocentric at this point in time, but with the help of understanding educators, the child will grow appropriately onto the next stages of development. Finally, the children need to develop emotionally/socially.

Children at this age enjoy role play and small world toys recreating scenes that they have witnesses and taken part in. They become interested in books and story’s, messy paly and mark making and often by 4 give meanings to those marks at 4 children will hold their concentration if the activity interests them.

They begin to point to things that they want and are able to follow simple directions. They are also able to scribble and point to one body part such as the nose. Something that a parent can do with their child at this age is to allow the child to pretend play this way they are able to play and take a role of something such as a doctor, or a mom. A parent should be using simple and clear words so that the child can follow directions or simply describe things and what the child is asking for. Parents should also encourage the child to play with blocks and puzzles. By the time they are four and five years of age they should have already gained more cognitive skills like; naming colors, understand how counting works, draw a person with a few body parts, can make predictions about a simple book, knows about everyday things such as money, time, and food. For a parent to expand their cognitive development it’s essential to get them involved in the community and explore their interest. Also allowing the children to read a book just by looking at the pictures. This way they are able to retell the story. Finally teaching them the days of the week, months, and time of day so they begin to get an idea of their daily

In order to create play, they must represent these activities mentally and translate them into actions. While the thinking of preoperational children is more advanced, Piaget emphasizes that children at this stage of cognitive development are still immature and are limited by egocentrism. They are all about self and perceive the world based on their own assumptions and experiences, they have difficulty relating to differences such as lighter, smaller, and softer.

The age range I have chosen is 3-7 yrs and I will discuss intellectual development. The main stages of intellectual development as defined by Jean Piaget for children aged 3-7 yrs are classified under the “Preoperational Stage” the second stage of four in his cognitive development theory. Piaget states that children between the ages of 3-7 yrs continue to explore their environment and develop their thinking from their experience. They use mental imagery and begin to represent their thinking symbolically through language and the symbolic use of objects, such as using a doll to represent a baby. They tend

Intellectual development relates to this stage because at this stage children learn about the power that the mind has. They learn how to smile and make eye contact. They realise who the main people in their lives are. As they see these people all the time their mind remembers each person and knows that they are the main people that will be taking part in his/her life.

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is one the most widely accepted, his four stages of development are age based.

In the sensorimotor stage the child discovers the environment through physical actions such as sucking, grabbing, shaking and pushing. During these first two years of life children realize objects still exist, even if it is out of view. This concept is known as object permanence. Children in the preoperational stage develop language skills, but may only grasp an idea with repeated exposure. As Piaget describes in the next stage, children draw on knowledge that is based on real life situations to provide more logical explanations and predictions. Lastly, in the formal operational stage children use higher levels of thinking and present abstract ideas.