The Play Years: Cognitive Development

1
Part III
Chapter Nine

• The Play Years Cognitive Development

Piaget and Vygotsky Childrens Theories Language E
arly-Childhood Education
2
The Play Years Cognitive Development

• thinking and learning from age 2 to 6
• remarkable advances in language and thought
• the simple sentence of the typical 2-year-old
  that are nonstop, complex outpourings of a
  talkative 6-year-old, who can explain almost
  anything

3
Piaget and Vygotsk

• famous for their description of cognition the
  eager learning of children are compatible in
  many ways

4
Piaget Preoperational Thinking

• Preoperational Intelligence
• Includes languages and imagination (in addition
  to the senses and motor skills of infancy)
• However, logical, operational thinking is not yet
  possible

5
Piaget Preoperational Thinking

• Obstacles to Logical Operation
• Centration
• a young child focuses (centers) on one idea,
  excluding all others
• Egocentrism
• childrens tendency to think about the world
  entirely from their own personal perspective
• Focus on Appearance
• a young child ignores all attributes that are not
  apparent

6
Piaget Preoperational Thinking

• Obstacles to Logical Operation
• Static Reasoning
• thinking that nothing changes Whatever is now
  has always been and always will be
• Irreversibility
• the idea that nothing can be undone the
  inability to recognize that something can
  sometimes be restored to the way it was before a
  change occurred

7
Piaget

• Conservation and Logic
• Conservation
• the idea that the amount of a substance remains
  the same (i.e., is conserved) when its appearance
  changes

8
Limitations of Piagets Research

• underestimated the conceptual ability of young
  children and infants
• Designing experiments to reveal what children
  seemed not to understand, rather than to identify
  what they could understand
• Relied on the childs words rather than the
  childs nonverbal signs in play context

9
Vygotsky Social Learning

• young children can be very sensitive to the
  wishes and emotions of others
• young children have social thoughts

10
Vygotsk

• Children as Apprentices
• cognitive development is embedded in a social
  context
• curious and observant
• ask questions

11
Vygotsky Apprentices cont.

• Apprentice in Thinking
• a person whose cognition is stimulated and
  directed by older more skilled members of society
• Guided Participation
• the process by which people learn from others who
  guide their experiences and explorations

12
Vygotsk

• Children as Apprentices
• guided participation

13
Vygotsk

• Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)
• the skills that a person can exercise only with
  assistance, not yet independently
• ZPD applies to the ideas or cognitive skills a
  person is close to mastering as well as to more
  apparent skills
• Scaffolding
• temporary support that is tailored to a learners
  needs and abilities and aimed at helping the
  learner master the next task in a given learning
  process

14
Vygotsk

• Language as a Toll
• Private Speech
• internal dialogue that occurs when people talk to
  themselves (either silently or out loud)
• Social Mediation
• a function of speech by which a persons
  cognitive skills are refined and extended through
  both formal instruction and casual conversation

15
Childrens Theories

• Theory-Theory
• the idea that children attempt to explain
  everything they see and hear by constructing
  theories

16
Childrens Theories

• Theory of Mind
• a persons theory of what other people might be
  thinking
• children must realize that other people are not
  necessarily thinking the same thoughts that they
  themselves are thinking
• the realization is seldom possible before age 4

17
Childrens Theories

• Belief and Reality Understanding the Difference
• a sudden leap of understanding occurs at about
  age 4
• between age 3 6 children come to realize that
  thoughts may not reflect reality

18
Childrens Theories

• Contextual Influences
• maturation of the brains prefrontal cortex
  appears to be the reason for the age-related
  advance in children

19
Language

• is pivotal to cognition in early childhood
• is the leading cognitive accomplishment in early
  childhood
• 24-month-olds begin this period with short
  sentences and limited vocabulary
• 6-year-olds end it with the ability to understand
  and discuss almost anything

20
Language

• Critical Period
• a time when a certain development must happen if
  it is ever to happen
• Sensitive Period
• a time when a certain type of development is most
  likely to happen and happens most easily

21
Language

• Vocabulary
• new words are added rapidly
• at age 2 knows about 500 words
• at age 6 about 10,000 words

22
Language

• Fast-Mapping
• the speedy and sometimes imprecise way in which
  children learn new words by mentally charting
  them into categories according to their meaning

23
Language

• Words and the Limits of Logic
• logical extension
• used to describe other objects in the same
  category
• use of available vocabulary to cover all the
  territory they want to talk about

24
Language

• Grammar
• includes the structure, techniques, and rules
  that are used to communicate meaning
• word order and word repetition, prefixes and
  suffixes, intonation and emphasis
• Overregularization
• the application of rules of grammar even when
  exceptions occur, so that the language is made to
  seem more regular than it actually is

25
Language

• Learning Two Languages
• bilingualism is an asseta necessity
• language-minority children are at a disadvantage
  (not the dominant language of the nation)
• more likely to
• do poorly in school
• feel ashamed
• become unemployed as adults
• learning the majority language is crucial

26
Language

• What is the goal of having a second language?
• research supports that children should learn at
  least two languagesthe language-sensitive years
  of early childhood are the best time
• soon after the vocabulary explosion, young are
  able to master two

27
Language

• Bilingualism, Cognition, and Culture
• Since language is integral to culture,
  bilingualism is embedded in emotions of ethnic
  pride and fear. This reality hampers
  developmental research.

28
Early-Childhood Education

• a hundred years ago children had no formal
  education until first grade
• today 3 5-year-olds in developed nations are in
  school
• early educational institutions differ, but names
  do not indicate the nature of the program

29
Early-Childhood Education

• Child-Centered Programs
• Montessori Schools
• The Reggio Emilia Approach
• Teacher-Directed Programs
• Intervention Programs
• Head Start
• Experimental Programs

30
Early-Childhood Education

• Costs and Benefits
• quality early-childhood education matters
• financial aspects are especially significant
• parents pay the bulk of the cost or preschool in
  the United States
• quality child care
• safety
• adequate space and equipment
• low adult-child ratio
• positive social interaction among children and
  adults
• trained staff and educated parents
• continuity helps
• How long has each staff member worked at the
  center?