Piaget's study in the development of a child's ability to think has revolutionized child psychology. This is a simple digest of a theory. A Theory is just that, a model to build from. It is the tutor who decides how to apply the theory.
| Developmental phase |
Approximate Age Group |
Stages of development |
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Question? How do children distinguish the difference between: - a material and mental reality;
- animate and inanimate objects; 3. natural and man made events.
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Sensorimotor |
Development of the control and use of sense organs and the body's skeletal-muscular system reflex actions become coordinated and perfected by physical movements and events physical movement and exploration of real objects |
| Birth to ½ or 2 years |
Initial use of inherent reflexes (sucking, crying)-at birth. |
- Primary circular reactions.
- Infants practice and develop kinesthetic awareness.
- Out of sight, seems to be out of mind, at the beginning;
- object permanence is learned by experience by around one year.
- Language development is primitive, and contains all the phonemes humanity will ever use.
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- Secondary Circular Reactions.
- Kinesthetic awareness extends to the environment.
- Movements evolve from accidental and random to more deliberate and intentional-Throughout stage.
- Language development evolves into syllables that the baby has heard so often in his environment.
- Words are formed as if by accident.
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- Secondary Schematica co-ordination.
- The infant can now combine several related schematicæ to achieve some objective.
- Learns to co-ordinate perceptual and motor functions (such as seeing object and then grabbing it).
- Child evolves into Bablalia and echolalia. Syllables are repeated and often without change.
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- Tertiary Circular Reaction.
- The infant now repeats an action with a goal in mind.
- This is the beginning of science. Learns relationship between means and ends (pushes aside barrier to get a toy).
- The child starts to respond to the hopes of his environment. An accidental, "pa pa" gets a favorable response from daddy. The child starts to learn that she or he can contribute to his or her environment.
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| Beginning forms of symbolic behavior (opens and closes mouth when doing same to a jar). A primitive cognitive structure begins to take effect. |
Preoperational |
2 to about 6+ Years |
Gradual accusation of language (new words, like "yummed it up," or "my ponytail was keeping me in bothers"). Language is now a vehicle for thought. They love and need to talk to adults. |
- Symbolic play:
- play with doll as baby, stick as sword. They enjoy pretending and the world becomes a stage for their performance.
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- Egocentric:
- (either not aware of another point of view, or not considering other's as important.)
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- Conservation
- Physical characteristics, such as size, judged by appearance only (a ball of play dough 'looks' bigger when made into a long roll, so therefor it 'is' bigger).
- Develops slowly; the ability to reverse operations is not understood (the milk cannot be visualized as being poured back into the first glass).
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- Animism:
- Inanimate objects have animal characteristics.
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- Realism:
- Children believe that 'psychological', or internal mental entities are real in the objective world — a child's dream is visible to all other people present in the room.
- Head Master's Note:
- There maybe some confusion here. This is not to confound the world of the Gentry, or suggest that it does not exist, (though Piaget may believe it does not). There is a world of beings that are not a part of our regular awareness. A child does not know the differences between their world and ours, which comes with maturity. Many adults have learned to ignore that realm, and so we fail to teach a child how to tell the differences.
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- Artificialism:
- a.) Children believe that living things are manufactured — one can make a puppy out of mud.
- b.) Children believe that physical phenomenæ are made by humans, for human purposes — snow is made for us to make snow-men.
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- Reversibility:
- Inability to think of the whole and its parts at the same time (given a set of blue and red wooden beads, the child will say that the blue beads will make a longer necklace than the wooden beads).
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Concrete Operational |
about 6 to 12 Years |
- Conservation:
- Begins to "conserve" (can see that quantity, size, length, volume, remain the same no matter how they are arranged).
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- Classification:
- process in which a child can group object by similarities.
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- Decentering:
- Can handle several ideas at the same time (given an array of objects of various colors and shapes, can find all the 'red, square, small ones").
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- Seriation:
- The process in which a child can arrange objects by size.
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- Reversibility:
- Starts to remove contradictions (can understand and follow rules, and make up own).
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- Ego:
- Can understand other points of view, although needs to be in real situations, rather than abstract ones.
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- Abstractions and Logic:
- Thoughts, ideals, values, beliefs. It is about this time that a child will be ready for higher Algebraic concepts, such as variables.
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Formal operational |
12 to Adulthood |
- Imaginary Audience:
- Adolescents believe that other people's thoughts are centered on them. All the world is a stage. Some of us are stars, others are characters, some work back stage. The danger of this time is that the actor will get stage fright.
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- Personal Fable:
- Adolescents may believe they have a unique and dramatic origin and destiny. They are fascinated with their own emotions and believe these emotions to be uniquely intense.
- This often becomes a source of conflict between Parents and their Children. If the lines of communication have not already been established, this may be a considerable challenge now.
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