Children are mini scientists who learn by discovery.
e.g give a child a bowl of
water to see what sinks
or floats.
Cognitive development occurs
through maturation of the brain
and increasing experience with
the environment
Schema Theory.
A schema is a
pocket of
knowledge.
Babies are born with
reflex schemas - they
know to suck to feed.
Assimilation- when you
can use a pre-existing
schema to understand
new info
Child has a schema for
addition. Given additions to do.
Can use current schema.
Accommodation - when you
change or create a schema to
understand new info
Child has a schema for addition. Given
subtractions to do. Needs to create a
new schema.
Equilibrium is mental ease
achieved by understanding the
world around you as the info fits
your current schemas.
Disequilibrium is mental
confusion because new info
does'nt fit in your schema. this
gives motivation to
accommodate.
Adaptation is fitting in your
environment by continually
changing or creating schemas.
Concepts like accommodation are
vague and difficult to prove or
disprove,
Underestimates the role of adults in helping children to learn.
Vygotsky says children can be encouraged
to learn through scaffolding.
Gelman tried to teach conservation to 4 yr olds.
Could'nt make them do it as they were'nt
cognitively ready.
Has aided primary education. Bowl of water example.
Sensory Motor Stage 0-2 Yrs.
Learn through movement
and senses.
Object Permanence.
Knowing that something is there
even though you can't see it.
Hid a toy behind a screen. Children under 8 months did not look
for the toy. This shows they do not have object permanence.
- May develop earlier. The didn't reach for the
toy as the didn't have the motor skills.
Bower and Wishart turned off
lights and found the children
reached for toy at 3 months.
Baillargeon found it is
present at birth.
Pre-operational Stage 2-7
Ego -Centrism
Being able to see another
persons perspective.
Three Mountains Task.
Children were shown a model
of 3 mountains. A doll is placed
facing them. They were asked
to pick the view of the doll
from images. 2-7 years chose
their own perspective.
Hughes and Donaldson asked asked
children to hide a toy from a policeman.
Children of 3.5 could do it.
3.5 not egocentric.
2-7 are ego centric.
Because they cant decentre (focus on
more than one aspect of a situation)
Conservation Tasks.
Being able to know
that something can
look different yet
still be the same
thing.
Piaget had two equal glasses of water and tipped one
into a thinner glass. Then he asked the children if they
were the same volume or different.
All children knew the first two glasses were
the same. However children in the
pre-operational stage thought the second
glass had the same amount of water in it.
2-7 can't conserve.
Because they cant decentre
(focus on more than one
aspect of a situation)
Because they cannot use reversibility
(be able to mentally return to what it
used to look like)
Didn't know why the
water was moved
Light et al - Told the children that the
water was moved because the glass
was cracked. 70% of children in the
properational stage could conserve.
They were asked the
same question twice
and so may have
thought they were
wrong the first time.
Class Inclusion
Knowing things
can belong to a
subgroup that
belongs to a
whole group.
Piaget had 20
brown beads
and 2 white
beads.
Q1. Are all beads wooden?
Q2 - Are there more
white or brown beads?
Q3 - Are there more
brown beads or wooden
beads.
Q1 and Q2 answered
correctly. Q3 wrong. They
didn't realise that the
subcategory of brown and
white beads belonged to the
category of wooden beads.
Strange questions
led to confusion.
Concrete
operational
stage 7-11
Can do class inclusion.
Are not ego-centric
Are able to decentre.
Can do conservation.
Can use
reversibility
Formal Operational Stage 11+
Now have the ability to imagine.
Problems are approached
systematically and in an
organised way.
Asked to work out how many
colour combinations would be
produced when an amount of
colours were was combined.
Only in the formal
operational stage, could
they do it.
Montorano - 10% of 17 yrs could
do it. Piaget overestimated
peoples abilities.
General evaluation.
His experiments were in
labs with high control and
cause and effect.
Low ecological validity. Recording behaviour in a lab not real life.