Piaget's Cognitive Theory Essay

Cognitive development is the term used to describe the construction of thought process, including remembering, problem solving and decision-making, from childhood through adolescence to adulthood. In this essay I will compare and contrast the theories of Piaget and Vygotsky, both of which were enormously significant contributors to the cognitive development component to/in psychology. In addition to this I will also weigh up the strengths and weaknesses of each theory and outline how they can be applied to an educational setting.

Flanagan (1996:72) states that, ‘Cognitive development is the acquisition of mental process involved in thinking and mental activity, such as attention, memory and problem solving.’ It is therefore a

Experts have argued “...the clear-cut ages and stages forming the basis of Piaget 's theory are actually quite blurred and blend into each other” (Donaldson, page 57). In Donaldson’s book, ‘Children 's Minds’, she suggests that Piaget may have underestimated children 's language and thinking abilities by not giving enough consideration to the contexts he provided for children when conducting his research (Castella, 2011). Although Piaget’s theory gives us a brief understanding of how children’s learning develops, not all children are taught the same way nor do they learn at the same pace. Each of the four stages have been criticised by experts. For instance on evaluation of the sensorimotor stage; Bower (1982) found that children display object permanence at a much younger age than Piaget suggested. We can agree or disagree with Piaget’s theory but one thing is certain, we will always imagine the stages whilst observing our children grow “... it is certainly true that, whether we agree with the theory or not, Piaget has changed the way we think about children’s thinking” (Sternberg, page 761).

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development was divided into schemas, adaptation processes, and stages of development. Schemas can be described as the building blocks of knowledge which allow us to development mental models of our environment. The adaptation processes are divided into equilibrium, assimilation, and accommodation. His stages of development were further split into four components of its own; sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational. Before Piaget, many assumed in a society that children were on equal grounds with adults in terms of reasoning and even to some extent, logical thinking. Piaget introduced his theory which essentially describes the active development of a child’s understanding of the world which disproved previous assumptions. The general understanding of this theory is that as their bodies grew their minds did as well.

The Sensorimotor is Piaget’s first stage, which happens between the ages of 0-2. Children's perception and the way they explore is based on their senses, therefore it is limited to the motor reflexes such as sucking, feeling and listening. A child develops through simple activities to a wider range by realising they are in control of their own actions. By knowing this, they also learn what actions are appropriate and the ability to communicate through sounds. Egocentrism occurs as the infant cannot distinguish between its self and its environment, but begins to throughout this stage. General symbolic function is described when

All children are unique as they learn, progress, develop at different rates and in a variety of ways. Nearly all theorists agree on the principles of children’s learning expansion in general and play a vital fragment of early childhood development. They all accept that cognitive learning is relatively systematic and takes place gradually at a variety of rates. Learning only occurs when experience causes a permanent change in an individual’s knowledge or behaviour (Weatherby-Fell, N. 2013). I am reviewing Burrus Federic Skinner’s behavioural theory and Jean Piaget cognitive development theory. This report style essay will provide an overview of the two theorists, a comparison between the two in relation to the image of the child, teaching, learning and development, and an analysis of how these two approaches align with the Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF). Subsequently, details of both theories will be discussed and explained to illuminate the differences and connections to how children learn. These two extremely well-known theorists’ approaches are stimulating, cause reflection upon learning methods and ensures thought provoking teaching.

This essay will describe and evaluate two of the main three theories concerning cognitive development and comment on how they have impacted education. Cognitive development is the mental process in which we think and how we remember, problem solving and decision making. There are three main theorists that have a theory on cognitive development, Piaget, Vygotsky and Bruner. Piaget and Vygotsky are the two main theorist whose theories will be described and evaluated within this essay Jean Piaget was a Swiss psychologist who researched how people learn and how people’s knowledge grows and did many experiments to back up his research. Lev Vygotsky is another theorist who researched how a child develops and how there language develops as they get older.

Piaget’s reception of numerous inquiries regarding accelerated cognitive development from American interviewers can be attributed to the values of American culture. This culture has progressively developed a social hierarchy that idolizes the American Dream, an abstraction that distributes reward equally on the measure of an individual’s capacity for achievement as well as any ensuing accomplishments. Consequently, this idea emboldens parents to seek new ways to improve their children’s prospects at a more successful life. One rumination of improving the aforementioned traits for a fulfilling life is by accelerating the child’s cognitive development from a young age. With an early realization of cognitive development, the child may possess

Piaget’s Critics In the world of cognitive brain development, especially when it comes to children and infants, no one has pioneered the field quite like Jean Piaget has. While Piaget might have been one of the first to create a comprehensive theory on brain development, this means over time researchers have found flaws and criticisms with Piaget’s methods and theories. Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is based on four key concepts: Assimilation, Accommodation, Adaptation, and Equilibrium. Assimilation is the concept of a child adding new information to an already existing classification, such as learning that a cat and dog can both be four-legged animals, but are not the same thing in my case as a child.

Most of the basic theories related to cognitive development in infancy and early childhood are based on Jean Piaget’s theories. He was a Swiss clinical psychologist known for his discoveries in child development. Piaget believed that children are born curious, they do experiments throughout their growing process to learn about the environment around them which is known as schemas. According to Piaget’s studies, the infants go through three main process to get a fully awareness of his/her surrounding environment, which are; Assimilation (when the baby learns to grab something, then she/he tries to grab other objects to see if it works) ,Accommodation (some objects can be lifted

During free time in the classroom June was playing with the dolls, when Chloe saw that she asked “Let 's be mommies”. June agreed and they started playing. They were feeding and caring for the baby. Then Jason wanted to play with them and they told him he can play as long as he was the father. Chloe and Jason were parents of the same baby. Jason would go to work, while Chloe stayed home taking care of the baby. Then Chloe would go to work and Jason would care for the baby.

Welcome to the exciting and adventurous camp of Cognitive Ability, where we challenge and cherish the precious minds of babies and teens through our fun activities of psychology through Piaget’s theory of cognitive ability. Piaget’s theory of cognitive ability was designed to distinguish the age at which a child’s cognitive ability was developed through the stages in which he classified as sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational (Lutz & Huitt, 2004). The goal of the camp is to define how children learn, remember, pay attention, and problem solve through each child’s development pace by a series of educational activities for all to enjoy.

Adolescence is a time of several changes. During adolescence people learn to become more autonomous. They become less reliant on their parents and more on themselves. One way they become more autonomous is cognitively. Many psychologists who study moral development use Piaget’s theory on cognitive development. These studies emphasize the change in reasoning that is used in making moral decisions. Psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg did a lot of research on the development of moral reasoning and expanded Piaget’s theory (Steinberg, 2008). He believed that moral development occurs in three levels and within those levels there are two distinct stages.

Cognition is a complex idea, making it difficult to describe. Hooper and Umansky (p. 307, 2014) define cognitive development as an individual’s ability to translate objects and events into a symbolic form that can be stored in the brain. Cognition can be measured with perceptual and conceptual skills. Perceptual skills are the connection between the senses and experiences. Conceptual skills are higher level processing, such as, making decisions and problem solving (Hooper and Umansky, 2014).

The first stage of Piaget’s development theory is the sensorimotor stage which takes place in children most commonly 0 to 2 years old. In this stage, thought is developed through direct physical interactions with the environment. Three major cognitive leaps in this stage are the development of early schemes, the development of goal-oriented behavior, and the development of object permanence. During the early stages, infants are only aware of what is immediately in front of them. They focus on what they