One of the theoretical approaches to children’s development is cognitive development. This is defined as being the changes in your mental abilities that happen as you grow, and focuses on cognition rather than other aspects such as personality and the surrounding environment. Doherty and Hughes (2014:38) explain this approach, saying that the cognitive area within the brain influences and impacts the way children initially view the world. The main theorist that worked on and studied cognitive development was Piaget. Piaget was a Swiss developmental psychologist and Philosopher, and was well known for his studies encompassing children. His theory focuses on the ways children think, reason, and solve problems, as well how they then adapt …show more content…
They also develop object permanency, where they understand that objects are constantly there, even if they cannot be seen. Plotnik (2008:389) gives an example of this using a 5-month-old child. He shows us that when a child is sat in front of a toy, he immediately tries to touch and grab it. However, once a screen is placed in front of the toy, the child looks away, and does not try to move the screen or find the toy. This shows us that the child has not developed this thinking skill yet. When the child grows to around 9 months, Plotnik (2008:389) describes how he will try to push the screen away to reveal the toy. By the end of the sensorimotor stage, children will have acquired this skill. The second stage within Piaget’s theory is known as the pre-operational stage, which covers children aged 2 - 7 years old. Doherty and Hughes (2014:39) describe this as being where children obtain major and minor motor skills, which will help them go through and control the world around them. This includes gross motor skills, such as running, and fine motor skills, such as drawing. Ault (1977:47), from the University of Utah, wrote about Piaget’s work, and said that one of the main components of the pre-operational stage is the development of symbolic functioning. This is known as the capability to make one thing embody something else which is not present. This can vary from highly concrete to highly abstract. An example that is given by Ault (1977:47) is about a
Piaget was the first psychologist to make a systematic study of cognitive development. Piaget’s work includes a detailed observational study of cognition in children. Piaget showed that young children think in different ways to adults. According to Piaget, children are born with a very basic mental structure (genetically inherited and evolved) on which all subsequent knowledge is based.
During the Sensorimotor stage (between birth and the age of two), Piaget claims that sensory and motor skills are developed, as well as claiming that infants are unable to grasp object permeance until eighteen to twenty-four months; Piaget argued that if a child could not see the item, it no longer existed to them. When the child’s age was between nine and ten months, more experiments were done into object permeance, resulting in the 'a not b ' test, in which one object was hidden underneath an item, and then switched. Despite the obvious difference in sizes underneath the two objects, the child would still believe the item to be under where it was originally found. Furthermore, Aguiara and Baillargeon (2002), suggested the violation of expectation; using the example of a doll moving between two opaque objects and reappearing in the centre – the child will then be surprised, as to them the object had no longer existed.
The sensorimotor stage infants develop their schemas through sensory and motor activities. Followed by the preoperational stage where children begin to think symbolically using words, to represent concepts. Next concrete operational stage children display many important thinking skills, like ability to think logically. Finally, formal operational stage young adolescences formulate their operations by abstract and hypothetical thinking. Piaget’s theory provides ample and insightful perspectives, so it remains the central factor of contemporary
Piaget – Cognitive Development - Observed his own children, plus others to develop his theories. His theory is broad and runs from birth to adolescence and includes concepts of language, scientific reasoning, moral development and memory. Piaget believed that children went
Cognitive development is the way a child sees, thinks and gains understanding of the world through interaction, influence, learned and genetic factors. There are four areas of intelligence and child brain development. They are: biological approaches to intelligence, cognitive succession of stages, knowledge, and intellectual ability.
This paper has presented an argument on how a child’s development is strongly influenced by environmental and cultural influences as well as parenting styles and education. Children begin to learn and experiment with social skills at school, allowing them to learn and understand social skills necessary for later life in life. Children who receive schooling at an early age perform better later in academics. I hope that by teaching in the ways that I described will help me accomplish this. I want my classroom of students to be excited to come to my class everyday to learn something that I hope will impact them for the rest of their lives. I want my classroom to be a very caring environment. I want my students to feel important and smart and to influence them to be the best that they can be. Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from
There is a plethora of child development theories that have a degree of influence over current practice. Each of which both have criticism and contrasting theories.
From the day they are born, children are immersed in a social world. Rapid learning takes place and is supported not only by parents, siblings, teachers and friends but also the important values and beliefs within their culture. All of this provides the foundations for cognitive development. As trainee teachers, it is fundamental that we have a deeper understanding of how children learn and how we can support learning. In order to do this we must first look at some of the theories of learning.
The second and third stage Piaget proposed are the preoperational and concrete stage at this stage children understand object permanence (that objects continue to exist even though they cannot see them) , spatial layouts and also the use of language for problem solving starts during the preoperational stage through constructing existing information and eventually expanding this information. However until the age of seven children still see the world from their egocentric view (i.e. refusing to see the world from a different point of view). At the concrete stage children are able to solve visual problems such as lining in order dolls from the tallest to the shortest, however they are not able to solve mental
During this stage the child, begin to go beyond the sensorimotor stage. They start you use words and images to represent the things that represented the world. Piaget believe that many preschoolers still lacked the ability to performs “operations”; which are internalized mental actions that allow children to do mentally what they previously could only do physically (). I can recall a few things that I may have done between these ages when I entered this stage. At the age of four I can remember being in pre-kindergarten playing games in which we would take on roles in which we were not.
Cognitive developmental theory is founded on the idea that children gain knowledge by exploring and influencing the world that is all around them. According to Mossler (2014) “After many years of observing the mental limitations of children, including his own, Piaget came to the conclusion that children of
Jean Piaget is considered to be very influential in the field of developmental psychology. Piaget had many influences in his life which ultimately led him to create the Theory of Cognitive Development. His theory has multiple stages and components. The research done in the early 1900’s is still used today in many schools and homes. People from various cultures use his theory when it comes to child development. Although there are criticisms and alternatives to his theory, it is still largely used today around the world.
Jean Piaget is one of the pioneers to child development, he was an important factor in the growth, development and one of the most exciting research theorists in child development. A major force in child psychology, he studied both thought processes and how they change with age. He believed that children think in fundamentally different ways from adults.. Piaget’s belief is that all species inherit the basic tendency to organize their lives and adapt to the world that’s around them, no matter the age. Children develop schemas as a general way of thinking or interacting with ideas and objects in the environment. Children create and develop new schemas as they grow and experience new things. Piaget has identified four major stages of cognitive development which are: sensorimotor stage, preoperational stage, concrete operations, and formal operations. According to the text here are brief descriptions of each of Piaget’s stages:
Educational Implications of Piaget’s Theory. Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is well-known and provides a basic understanding of the cognitive process and how children
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