PIAGET'S THEORY OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

1. Jean Piaget
His Life
His Theory
Applications in Education

2. Outline
 Who is Jean Piaget?
 How did he Start Working in
Psychology?
 Piagetian Glossary
 His Theory:
– Stages of Development:
 Sensorimotor Stage (0 – 2 years)
 Preoperational Stage (2 – 6/7 years)
 Concrete Operational Stage (6/7 years – 11 years)
 Formal Operational Stage (11 –15 years)
 Applications of his theory in Education

3. Who’s Jean Piaget?
 Place Of Birth:
Switzerland
 Date of Birth:
August 9th, 1896
 First Appearance: at
the age of 11, he
wrote a short notice
on an albino sparrow
– this is considered
as the start of a
brilliant scientific

4. How did he Start Working in Psychology?
 PHD in Natural Science.
 Moving to France – Working at a
school.
 First experiential studies of the
growing mind.

5. Piagetian Glossary
 Genetic Epistemology: The study of the
origins of knowledge.
– Do we just add more information over time?
No!
– Children are not just little adults who have
not acquired as much knowledge.
– They think in qualitatively different ways.
– Their thinking is not illogical, but employs a
different logic.
Example

6. Piagetian Glossary
 Schemas: Simple skills that the
individual possesses and that direct the
way this individual is to explore his/her
environment and gain more knowledge.
Example

9. Piagetian Glossary
Example
 Assimilation: Incorporation of new
material from the environment into a
schema.

11. Piagetian Glossary
Example
 Accommodation: Changing a certain
schema to fit the environment.

13. Piagetian Glossary
 Adaptation: Piaget’s term of what we
call “Learning”; individuals use schemata
to understand features of the world.

14. Piagetian Glossary
 Equilibrium: when Assimilation and
Accommodation work in harmony
together; it means that adaptation is
driven by a biological drive to obtain
balance between schemes and the
environment.
 Further Investigations…

15. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Basic Assumption:
– Development is children’s attempts to make
sense of the world.
 Development is the orderly, qualitative,
and adaptive changes in:
– Physical
– Personal
– Social
– Cognitive
Aspects of an individual.

16. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Factors that Influence Development:
– Maturation
– Activity
– Social Transmission

17. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Two major characteristics to the
theory:
– The process of coming to know
– The stages the individual moves through as
he/she gradually acquire the ability to know.

18. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Video 1: Introduction to Piaget.

19. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Sensorimotor Stage (0 – 2 years)
 Preoperational Stage (2 – 6/7 years)
 Concrete Operational Stage (6/7 – 11
years)
 Formal Operational Stage (11– 15 years)

20. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Sensorimotor Stage: (0-2 Years)
– Infant uses senses and motor abilities to
understand the world.

21. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor Stage
Period Characteristics
0-1 months -Reflex activity only
-No differentiation
1-4 months -Hand-mouth
coordination
-Differentiation via
sucking
4-8 months -Hand-eye
coordination
-Repeats unusual
events

22. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor Stage
Period Characteristics
8-12 months -Coordination of two
schemata
-Object permanence
attained
12-18 months -New means through
experimentation
-follows sequential
displacements
18-24 months -Internal
representations
-New means through
mental combinations

23. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor Stage
 Video 2: Object Permanence

24. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Preoperational Stage: (2-6/7 Years)
– The development of internal representation
permits the young child to begin to use
symbols to represent objects

25. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Preoperational Stage
 Egocentric Stage (2-4 years)
– Problems are solved through representation
– Language develops
– Thought and logic are both EGOCENTRIC

26. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Preoperational Stage – Egocentric Stage
 Video 3: Egocentrism

27. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Preoperational Stage
 Intuitive Stage (5-7 years)
– Child cannot solve conservation problems
– Judgments are based on perception rather
than logic

28. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Preoperational Stage – Intuitive Stage
 Video 4: Conservative Tasks

29. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Concrete Operational Stage (7-11
years)
– Child attains reversibility
– Child can solve conservative problems
– Logical operations developed and applied to
concrete problems
– Child cannot solve complex verbal problems

30. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Concrete Operational Stage
 Video 5: Logical Operations

31. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
 Formal Operational Stage (11-15 years)
– Child can logically solve all types of problems
– Child can think scientifically
– Child can solve complex verbal problems
– Cognitive structures attained

32. Piaget’s Theory:
Stages of Cognitive Development
Formal Operational Stage
 Video 6: Formal Operational Child

33. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
“Learning Comes Through “Doing” – It is an
active process”

34. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
 Learner-Centered Philosophy
 Activity is Essential
 Individualized Instruction

35. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
 Teaching at all levels of education must
be
founded on the activity of the learner.
Concepts
CANNOT be taught through verbal
instruction.

36. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Six Principles
1. The teacher should create an
environment and an atmosphere in which
children will be active and will initiate
and complete their own activities. The
teacher should provide time to spare and
materials to complete self-initiated
activities.

37. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Six Principles
2. Teachers should give feedback to their
students when dealing with social-
arbitrary knowledge, but when it comes
to physical and logical-mathematical
knowledge feedback should not be given.

38. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Six Principles
3. Teachers should let the preoperational
child go through stages of being
“wrong”.

39. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Six Principles
4. Teachers should know that some types
of knowledge are best learned and
motivated through interaction with other
children.

40. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Six Principles
5. View all Aspects of Knowledge as
inseparable.

41. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Six Principles
6. If you want a child to acquire a
specific fact or piece of content that is
not available to him, teach it directly
and reinforce the learning.

42. Application of Piaget’s Theory in Education
Other Teaching Considerations
 Teachers are organizers of the learning
process.
 Teachers are assessors of the child’s
thinking.
 Teachers are initiators of group
activities
 Materials

43. References
 A Brief Biography of Jean Piaget –
Piaget Archives.
 Jean Piaget – Psychology History
 The Piaget Handbook for Teachers and
Parents – Teachers’ College Press
 Piaget for the Classroom Teacher –
Wadsworth
 Knowledge and Development – Easly
 The Teaching of Young Children –
Schoken

44. The End