Biologist turned child psychologist Jean Piaget was born in Switzerland in 1896. Piaget’s studies focused on the intelligence and social awareness of young children. In the 60’s educationalists developed new teaching methods from Piaget’s findings such as ‘learning through play’ and ‘reading readiness’, these methods are still prevalent today.
The idea of egocentric speech also came from some of Piaget’s work, the theory being that young children communicate in a way that is focused on the self “Erin wants to go swimming”, “Erin is eating a banana”, they find it difficult, if not impossible to see the world from anothers’ point of view. It was also observed that young children will use such language even when in the company of others, Piaget coined the term ‘collective monologue’ to accurately describe the way in which children will use egocentric speech in the presence of peers which may appear as communication, but is actually several children talking about themselves in the company of each other – sound familiar?
Based on his observations Piaget developed a general theory that children progress through four stages of cognitive development. Although children may pass through these stages at slightly different rates, Piaget found that it was impossible for a child to miss a stage completely.
As a parent I found these stages quite interesting.
Stage 1: Sensori-motor (birth – 2 years
The first stage involves the infant using his senses and motor abilities to explore, this begins with ‘primary circular reactions’ ie doing something over and over again – like sucking a thumb. The next phase (secondary circular reactions) moves onto objects within the environment ie grasping a ball, or playing with a light/sound toy – she realises that she has the power to make interesting things happen again and again. Finally during the second year tertiary circular motions come into play (pun not intended), this involves transferring the grasping/banging skills and trying them out on different things – banging a drum, banging the table, banging the door!
Stage 2: Pre-operational (2-7 years old)
The term ‘pre-operational’ describes the stage where a child lacks logical understanding. They can’t see anything from another point of view, physical or emotional. They take things at face value and struggle to understand the full consequence of an action. They are still egocentric, believing a lot that the worl revolves around them, clearly this isn’t helped by the fact they cannot see things from anyonelse’s perspective!
Stage 3: Operational (7-12 years old)
Finally children at this stage can understand a point of view other than their own. Their logical thinking is more advanced and so problem solving becomes easier.
Stage 4: Formal Operations
At this stage children can apply logic to maths and consider events in the future or in another place.
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I'm a 27 year old mum to 4 year old Erin. We live just outside Edinburgh in a small village. I've been blogging for four years and write about anything and everything that takes my fancy.
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