Week 5 - early childhood - B - Cognitive development Flashcards
In Piaget’s theory, early childhood is a crucial turning point in children’s cognitive development because this is when thinking becomes ________________
representational (internalised images/symbols)
preoperational stage
cognitive stage from age 2 to 7 during which the child becomes capable of representing the world symbolically—for example, through the use of language—but is still very limited in ability to use mental operations
conservation
mental ability to understand that the quantity of a substance or material remains the same even if its appearance changes
centration
Piaget’s term for young children’s thinking as being centred, or focused, on one noticeable aspect of a cognitive problem to the exclusion of other important aspects
reversibility
ability to reverse an action mentally
egocentrism
cognitive inability to distinguish between one’s own perspective and another person’s perspective
animism
tendency to attribute human thoughts and feelings to inanimate objects and forces
classification
ability to understand that objects can be part of more than one cognitive group; for example, an object can be classified with red objects as well as with round objects
Two types of claims against Piaget’s theory of preoperational thought in early childhood
claims that he underestimated children’s cognitive capabilities
claims that development is more continuous and less stage-like than he proposed.
theory of mind
ability to understand thinking processes in one’s self and others
Perspective-taking ability advances considerably from age ____ to ____
3 to 6
By age _____, as they begin to use language more, children show increasing recognition that others have thoughts and emotions that can be contrasted with their own
2
At age _____, children begin to use words that refer to mental processes, such as ‘think’, ‘remember’ and ‘pretend’
2
By age _____, children know it is possible for them and others to imagine something that is not physically present (such as an ice cream cone).
3
Two factors generally make cultural learning in developed countries different from cultural learning in traditional cultures:
- children in developed countries are often apart from their families for a substantial part of the day
- the activities of adults in a complex economy are less accessible to children’s learning than the activities that children learn through guided participation in traditional cultures, such as child care, tending animals and food preparation.
