Cognitive Flashcards
what are children learning at the beginning of cognitive development?
how to accomplish goals
what are the children learning at the end of cognitive development
manipulating symbols and can make accurate judgements about others’ thoughts, feelings, and behaviours
what is sensorimotor play?
- 12 month old child
- spends playtime exploring and manipulating objects
- ex. toys in mouth, shaking them, moves them along floor
what is constructive play?
- Age 2
- use objects to build or construct things
ex: building tower, drawing pictures, digging in sand
What is first pretend play?
- toy is used for its actual or typical purpose, actions still oriented to the self, but some pretending occurs (ex. drink from toy cup)
- 15-21 months: recipient of pretend action is another person or toy (ex. toy cup being used on a stuffed bear instead of child)
what is substitute pretend play?
- 2 and 3 years old
- use objects to stand for something altogether different.
- ex. broom as horse, trucks our of blocks
what is sociodramatic play?
- preschool years (5 yo?)
- play parts or take roles, could include giving rules to act their role correctly.
- may create imaginary companions
- ex. playing house
What is rule-governed play?
- 5 or 6 yo
- play games according to certain rules and follow them for longer periods of time
- ex. smallest person is baby
What is the preoperational stage? Who introduced this stage?
- Piaget
- children become proficient in the use of symbols in thinking and communicating but still have difficulty thinking logically
includes: egocentrism, centration, and conservation
What is egocentrism
the young child’s belief that everyone sees and experiences the world the way she does
What is centration
- the child thinks of the world in terms of one variable at a time
- Cant think of two things at a time
What is conservation
the understanding that matter can change in appearance without changing in quantity
- not developed before age 5
- what it looks like is what it is
What are the general challenges to Piaget’s view?
Research generally confirmed Piaget’s observations, but preschoolers are a great deal more cognitively sophisticated than Piaget thought
What are the challenges to Piaget’s view concerning egocentrism and perspective taking?
- Flavell’s stage 1 (2-3 years old): the child knows that others experience things differently
- Flavell’s stage 2 (4-5 years old): the child develops rules to figure out what the other person experiences
- Children use emotion to elicit a response from others
What are the challenges to Piaget’s view concerning appearance and reality?
- 4- to 5-year-olds understand that the same object can represent different things
- Challenges taking another’s perspective not limited to children
What are the influences of development of theories of mind?
- Correlated with performance on Piaget’s tasks
- Development of a theory of mind is enhanced by pretend play, shared pretense with other children, and discussion of emotion-provoking events with parents
- Some level of language facility may be a necessary condition for the development of a theory of mind
What are the alternative theories of early childhood thinking?
- information processing theories
- metamemory
- metacognition
- vygotsky;s socio-cultural theory
what is short-term storage space (STSS)?
- theorist Robbie Case’s term for the working memory
- There is a limit to how many ‘schemes’ can be attended to
What is operational efficiency?
a neo-Piagetian term that refers to the maximum number of schemes that can be processed in working memory at one time
Does operational efficiency improve or get worse as the child ages?
improves
What is metamemory?
knowledge about how memory works and the ability to control and reflect on one’s own memory function
What is metacognition?
knowledge about how the mind thinks and the ability to control and reflect on one’s own thought processes
What are the stages of vygotskys socio-cultural theory?
- primitive stage
- naive psychology stage
- egocentric speech satge
- ingrowth stage
What is the primitive stage?
- part of vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory
- Infant possesses mental processes similar to animals-conditioning
What is the naive psychology stage?
- part of vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory
- Learns to use language to communicate but does not understand symbols
What is the egocentric speech stage?
- part of vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory
- Uses language as a guide to solve problems
- Becomes internalized by 6-7 (in their heads)
What is the ingrowth stage?
- part of vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory
- Logical thinking results from internalization of speech acquired from children and adults in a social world
What type of language do children know when they enter early childhood?
Children enter the early childhood period producing only a limited number of words and simple sentences
What type of language do children know leaving early childhood?
- leave it as accomplished, fluent speakers of at least one language
How does vocabulary grow from age 1-6? (how many words at what age?)
- Age 1 year = a dozen words
- Age 2½ = 600 words
- Age 5 or 6 = 15,000 words
What is fast mapping?
the ability to categorically link new words to real-world referents
- categorize things that mean similar things – animals, cat/kitty
What does grammar explosion include?
- inflections
- questions and negatives
- overregularization
- complex sentences
What is using inflections?
- Additions that change meaning
- Earliest inflection in English is the addition of –ing: “Where going?”
What is using questions and negatives?
A set of rules is used that doesn’t match adult speech
What is using overregularization?
- Using rules when they don’t apply
Ex. Say mouses instead of mice
What is using complex sentences?
Using conjunctions to combine two ideas or using embedded clauses
What is phonological awareness?
- Children’s understanding of the sound patterns of the language they are acquiring
- Breakdown words or blend words to pronounce other words
- Start to understand combination of sounds to say words
- Knowledge of the language’s system for representing sounds with letters
How can phonological awareness be learned?
- Can be learned in school through instruction
- Primarily develops through word play (Nursery rhymes, Games involving repetitive words)
The greater a child’s phonological awareness, the faster they learn _____
to read
what is invented spelling?
a strategy young children with good phonological awareness skills use when they write
Who is Canadian author malcolm Gladwell?
put forth the notion that language plays a role in our ability to master numbers
What is numeracy?
ability to use numbers
What factors influence numeracy?
- Early parental/caregiver influences are important
What is intelligence quotient (IQ)?
the ratio of mental age to chronological age; also, a general term for any kind of score derived from an intelligence test
What does IQ predict well and unwell?
• IQ tests do a fairly good job of predicting success in school but don’t measure other variables of success
- several important limitations; there is concerns over cultural biases associated with Indigenous children
Ex. Mental state (anxiety, stress, fatigue), language and understanding
Does heredity influence intelligence?
twin studies and studies of adopted children show strong heredity influences on IQ
- highly important influence
Does environment influence intelligence?
- IQ is clearly due to environment or family influences, or interactions between environment and heredity
what are specific family interactions that foster higher IQ scores?
- More interesting, complex environment
- Parental reaction and feedback
- Parents use rich and accurate language in the “zone of proximal development”
- Intergenerational influences (e.g., history of aggression)
What is the impact that preschool influence has on intelligence?
- Enrichment programs that start at infancy have a more profound effect than those that start at age 3
- Long-term impact on children
Less likely to be placed in special education, repeat a grade
Higher scores in reading and math at age 12
what are the 5 domains of readiness? and who identified them?
- eleanor thomas
1. Language and communication skill
2. Academic skill
3. Self-regulation of learning
4. Self-control of behaviour
5. Social competence and independence
According to Thomas’ study, girls enter school with better:
- communication skills
- abilites in copying and symbol use
- attention
- self-control of impulsive behaviour
- independence in dressing
According to Thomas’ study,boys enter school with better:
curiosity
Programs that target high risk children results in: (5)
- Better school readiness
- Less time spent in special education
- Superior high school graduation rates
- Higher employment income
- Lower rates of criminal arrests
What is reaction range?
a range between upper and lower boundaries for traits such as intelligence, which is established by one’s genes; one’s environment determines where, within those limits, one will fall
