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Jean Piaget's Stages Of Cognitive Development

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Jean Piaget was a psychologist who believed that children progressed through different stages of cognitive development. He stated that the four stages of cognitive development, are ‘critical’ to children’s progress. The four distinct stages that Piaget suggested were: The sensorimotor stage 0-2 years, The preoperational stage which involves children ages 2-7 years, The concrete operational stage that includes children aged 7-11 years and The formal operational stage 11 years+. Piaget named this theory, The Stage Theory (Piaget, J. 1951 The Child’s Conception of the world. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul). On a whole, the cognitive development of children is summed up and concluded by Piaget’s stage theory. According to Piaget, cognitive development …show more content…

These structures provide evidence with which main behaviour patterns can be explained, these behaviour patterns are shown through doing (it can also be called sensory motor). However, in order for Piaget to imply such explanatory stages, his referral to patterns in behaviour isn’t sufficient due to the predominance of a given characteristic, which also means that behaviours aren’t the only things that have an impact on children’s learning (Greene, 2008). Key concept 3 – “These overall structures are integrative and non-interchangeable. Each results from the preceding one, integrating it as a subordinate structure, and prepares from subsequent one, into which it is sooner or later itself integrated” (Wild, M 2007). This concept means that once on stage has been passed, the individual can not go back to it. Completion of each stage and the experiences that the individual comes across, all have a huge impact on the following stage; hence why Piaget refers to them as “integrative” and “non-interchangeable”. Each of Piaget’s stages relates to the next (Sigelman and Rider, …show more content…

Despite the fact that Piaget didn’t base his theory specifically on children education, maybe education institutions such as nurseries, schools and learning centres are now structured in a way in which children should be taught at the level of which they are prepared (developmentally). The idea of children being taught in a supportive environment is also derived from the stage theory, implied by Piaget. Other strategies such as: peer marking and teaching, social interactions and allowing children to develop ways to see inconsistencies within their thinking, also sprout from Piaget’s Stage Theory (many of these strategies are still used in schools and learning centres, to this day) (Hulit, Howard, and Fahey,

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