Transformations in a child's thought, language, and intelligence
Theories:
-Piaget's Stages of Cognitive Development
-Kohlberg's Stages of Moral Development
-Multi-theoretical perspectives of language, intelligence, and children with special needs
Conservation
-A conceptual tool that allows a child to recognize that when altering the appearance of an object, the basic properties do not change
-A young child fails to master this task because the way things look influences how the child thinks
-Based on Einstein's famous formula, E = mc², which states that mass and energy can be transformed from one to the other, but their total amount is fixed (conserved) so that it neither increases nor decreases
-Piaget used this concept when referring to numbers, volumes, weights, and matter (concrete operations)
Adaptation
Children adjust to new information about their environment in order to function more effectively
Fundamental concepts:
-Assimilation
-Accommodation
Assimilation
-Refers to the way children incorporate new information with existing schemes in order to form a new cognitive structure
-Children fit this new knowledge into a template of existing schemes
Example: A preschool child calls a lion "doggie" because the child only knows one type of four-legged animal.
Accommodation
Occurs when children take existing schemes and adjust them to fit their experience
Example: A preschool child plays with the keys on a piano to hear the different sounds of musical notes. When he tries this with an electric keyboard, he quickly learns that the keyboard must be turned on before it can be played. He must accommodate this new information to fit the experience.
Piaget's Cognitive Learning Process
Four assumptions of Piaget's Stages of Cognitive Development
1. Children are organically inspired to think, learn, and comprehend
2. Children see the world differently than adults
3. Children's knowledge is ordered into mental struc
