Intellectual Development Flashcards
Piagets: Stages of cognitive development
Sensorimotor (0-2): Object permanence develops at 8 months - They will continue to look for a hidden object as they know it still exists.
Pre-operational (2-7): Don not understand how to conserve because they don’t understand numbers, mass and volume. There thinking is egocentric - They only see the world from their point of view
Concrete operational (7-11): They are able to conserve and are less egocentric. They have not developed concrete logical thinking - Able to think through complicated ideas in their head without having to see a concrete image.
Formal operational (11-18): They have developed concrete logical thinking.
Piagets: The development of schemas
A schema is a category of knowledge as well as a process of acquiring knowledge.
- a child develops concepts about the world around them (a state of equilibrium). As they experience situations where new information is presented their schemas are upset (a state of disequilibrium). As the new information is accommodated the original schemas modify or changed (a state of equilibrium).
Evaluation of Piaget - Strengths and weaknesses
:) - His work has influenced early education i.e. existence of discovery play
:) - considers nature and nurture
:( - He based his theory on observation on a small number of of children - Difficult to say all children will go through these stages
:( - Bruner disagrees with Piagets fixed stages - With adult support children can be helped to progress higher thinking levels. It depends on the amount of encouragement.
Chomsky’s model of language acquisition
Chomsky believed that the ability to develop language is genetically programmed into individuals. Their ability to understand and develop language has evolved naturally the same way children have the ability to stand and walk.
- He believes there is a critical period from childhood to adolescence, during they which children may learn language and gain language. (If language input does not occur until after this critical period the individual will never achieve a full command of language)
Chomsky’s model of language acquisition - Strengths and Weaknesses
:) - The ability to develop language is genetically programmed into individuals.
:( - Chomsky did not take into the children who experience delayed language development e.g. Down syndrome.
