Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development
Understand the Developing Child's Mind and How Kids Learn
Sep 12, 2009
Jean Piaget's observations have given insight to psychologists and educators for generations, for those who have asked the question, "How do children learn?"
Piaget's Theory of a Child's Cognitive Development
Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development postulated that human development occurs in a sequence, through the following stages.
- Sensorimotor state (infancy, birth to age two), characterized by egocentrism
- Pre-operational stage (preschool, ages two to seven), in which object permanence begins to develop and egocentrism fades
- Concrete operational stage (childhood, ages seven to eleven), during which the child can conserve but has limited logical abilities
- Formal operational stage (adolescence, after age eleven), when abstract thought develops.
Researchers continue to study the characteristics of these stages of child development and how children learn.
Basis for Piaget's Theory of How Kids Learn
Piaget’s theory highlights the role of biological nature, and is based partly on a (now-discredited) biogenetic law of Haeckel, that ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny.
This law would predict that children develop in the same manner that evolution progressed: from simple to complex, acquiring skills as various body systems develop.
How Children Construct Knowledge
One important theme of Piaget’s work is that children make their own schema for understanding knowledge. This theme is exemplified by the child in Yvonne Scott’s classroom (from the “Learning Classroom” series) where the children learned about butterflies and then constructed plaques as newly-minted experts on the subject.
How Cognition Changes During Childhood
Another lesson that Piaget’s work offers us today is the concept that children’s cognition changes substantially in qualitative ways during development. The students in George Mixon’s class (from the “Learning Classroom” series) were able to discuss momentum in quantitative, mathematical terms that would be inaccessible to Yvonne Scott’s class (due to the abstract nature of the terms).
Problems with Piaget's Theory of Child Development
Daniel Willingham, in his critique of Piaget, notes that research shows that cognitive development does not occur in distinct stages. Willingham also argued that the learning process for children does not entail stability followed by “seismic” change to new level of stability, as Piaget described. Comprehension does not depend on developmental stage, but instead on the “details the child is asked to comprehend and how they are asked to show that they understand it.”
He offers the example of Egocentrism, which Piaget predicted to be pervasive from birth to two years. However, eighteen-month-old children know to give the “yucky” broccoli to the examiner who prefers it, even if they like goldfish crackers. The effects of a child’s present state of cognitive development do not pervade all aspects of functioning, and their functioning in some situations is not consistent with functioning in other situations.
McDevitt points out that development is not a unitary, simple process, but a mesh of several interlocking processes.
Applying Piaget's Theory Today
Despite these difficulties, Piaget’s theory serves as a rough map of children’s cognitive abilities. McDevitt offers the examples of tolerating repetitive dropping/throwing behavior of infants because this behavior helps to develop infants sensorimotor capacities, keeping patience with the illogical on the part of preschoolers who are dealing with same quantities in different forms, and allowing the disproportionate fervor of adolescents who are not yet ready to accept realistic principles for how society operates.
Sources:
- Darling-Hammond, L. The Learning Classroom: Theory Into Practice [Video]. Detroit, MI: Detroit Public Television and Mort Crim Communications, 2003.
- Edelman, G. M. Second nature: brain science and human knowledge. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006.
- McDevitt, T. M., & Ormond, J. E. Child development: Educating and working with adolescents. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 2004.
- Willingham, D. T. What is Developmentally Appropriate Practice? American Educator, Summer, 34-39, 2008.
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