World of Children
1st ed
Chapter 8:Cognitive Development
in Early Childhood
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Piaget’s Pre-operational Thought
Vygotsky’s Sociocultural View
Information Processing
Language Development
Early Childhood Education
Kindergarten Readiness
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Piaget’s Theory
2nd stage (ages 2 to 7)
Preoperational thought – children use
mental representations for objects and
events that are not physically available to
see, hear and touch.
Operations – logical processes that can be
reversed – example: pouring liquid into a
container
Children at this age do not think with
operations – thus, preoperational
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Use of mental representation in
language
Average 2 yr old knows 200 words
Average 6 yr old knows 10,000 words
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Language development is based on children’s
mental representational abilities.
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Increased vocabulary gives children the ability
to talk about things that are not present.
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Use of mental representation in art
Increased complexity in art work
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Use of mental representation in play
Symbolic play – children use one object to stand
for another
At 18 months, children can pretend to talk on a
phone if they have a play phone
At age 2, they can use a banana as a phone
At age 5, they can use almost anything as a
phone – object does not have to look anything
like a phone
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Beginning of Intuitive Thought
Intuitive thought : reasoning based on
personal experience rather than formal
logic
Children reason on what “seems like”
ex: pg 258
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Evidence of Intuitive thought
Egocentrism: inability to take another
person’s perspective
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Evidence of Intuitive Thought
Animism : inanimate objects have feelings
ex: sun is shining b/c it’s happy.
ex: putting pencil down b/c it’s tired.
 Artificialism : natural events are under people’s
control
ex: sun went down b/c someone switched it off.
ex: moon isn’t shining b/c someone blew it out.
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As children have more experiences, they move towards logical thought.
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Piaget’s research
Conservation : the idea that certain
properties of an object remain the same
even if physical appearance changes
Piaget analyzed children’s responses to
conservation problems to understand
preoperational thought
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Piaget’s research
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Piaget’s Theory
Why do preoperational children give
“incorrect” answers?
 Centration : focus on one aspect of a
situation – height of liquid
 Static endpoints : focus on beginning and
end, not process in the middle
 Lack of reversibility : cannot visualize
reversing the process
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Piaget’s legacy
Piaget influenced education in many ways
 the development of interactive and
hands-on materials for active learners
 guidelines for when to introduce topics
based on cognitive development
 challenges to children’s existing cognitive
structures to help them grow in
understanding
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Vygotsky’s Theory
Lev Vygotsky (1896 – 1934)
 born in what would be part of Soviet
Union
 firm believer in Marxism – equality for all
 wrote several books and articles before
death from tuberculosis at age 38
 most of his work was not published until
long after his death
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Vygotsky’s Theory
Central idea – children develop cognitive
structures from their culture and their
social interactions, mainly by listening to
the language that is around them
Children listen to social speech – what is
said to them, and turn it into private
speech – the speech they say out loud to
themselves
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Vygotsky’s Theory
ex: girl learning to draw a circle
“Start your mark going around like this,
then bring it all the way around until the
marks meet each other.”
 Almost all children use private speech
 When learning a new or difficult task,
children rely on private speech
 Children who use private speech the
most do better in difficult tasks.
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Vygotsky’s Theory
internalization : the process of taking
external speech and making it internal
and mental.
 as children master a concept they need
less private speech
 eventually they internalize the concept as
silent inner speech.
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Vygotsky’s Theory
Mediation : the introduction of concepts,
knowledge, skills and strategies to the child
Adults may break down the task into smaller
steps, give hints on how to accomplish it,
provide tips on what to look for, etc.
Successful mediation depends on making sure it is
appropriate to the child’s level of understanding
and ability.
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Mediation example
How would an adult mediate to a child on
how to do a difficult puzzle?
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Vygotsky’s theory
Zone of proximal development : the range
of problems that the child can solve with
some assistance
The cognitive structures in this zone are
ones that the child has started to
internalize but have not been completely
internalized.
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Zone of Proximal Development
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Vygotsky’s Theory
Effective instruction involves giving child
challenges, along with help in solving them.
Adults provide scaffolding – temporary support for
child while cognitive structure is being
developed
 Doing part of the task
 Simplifying difficult tasks
 Talking the child trough the task
 Giving reminders
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Peers also provide instruction and
support during collaborative learning.
Help each other solve problems
Share their knowledge & skills
Discuss strategies & knowledge
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Piaget and Vygotsky
Piaget
pride in autonomy
and independence
believed that children
construct their own
cognitive structures as
they adapt to
environment
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Vygotsky
cultures and society
change over time and
how that change
influences cognitive
development
believed that children
adopt cognitive
structures of people
around them
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Information Processing Theory
Central idea - that humans receive,
process, sort, store and retrieve
information similar to the way computers
do
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Key assumption – humans are limited in
capacity to process information
We can only do so much!!!!!!
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Information Processing Theory
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Changes in cognitive processes
Older children are able to
process more information,
process it faster, and control
attention span better then
young children.
Processing capacity
amount of information that a
person can remember or
think about at one time –
increased flexibility of
thought
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Changes in cognitive processes

1.
2.
Processing
efficiency speed
and accuracy of
processing
information.
Operating space
Storage space
Older children have
better memories.
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Changes in cognitive processes
Automaticity
: ability to
perform task with little
conscious effort – increased
complexity of thought
Important
for increasing
processing efficiency.
 frees up more cognitive
capacity for other tasks.
Learning to read
1.
recognizing letters
2.
forming words
3.
reading sentences
4.
reading with expression,
comprehension, what
will happen next?
5.
Compare and contrast
w/ other books
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Changes in cognitive processes
Attention
: ability to
focus on specific
information without
being distracted by
other stimuli –
increased accuracy
as
children get older
1. maintain focus for
longer periods of time
2. ignore distracting
information
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Metacognition
Metacognition:the understanding that
people have about their own thought
processes and memory
Includes knowledge of
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Tasks- long list of words more difficult to
remember than short list
Strategies- repeating telephone # will help
you remember it for a short time
People- limits to what a person can
remember
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Metacognition
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Rapid improvement after age 5
young children are optimistic about their
own memory abilities
more accurate when estimating how
much a peer can remember
How is overestimating their abilities good
for children?
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Theory of the Mind
Theory of the Mind : an integrated
understanding of what the mind is, how it
works, and why it works that way.
Research on children’s theory of mind has
looked at:
1. What children know about thinking in
general
2. How well they understand the thoughts
of people
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Theory of the Mind
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3 year olds know:
-that mental objects are different from
real objects.
- it is possible to carry out mental
activities that could not happen in the real
world
- dreams are not real life
- many believe that different people
have the same dream
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Theory of the Mind
Young children are still dev. their
understanding of mental actvitties
Indicator of theory of mind – appearancereality distinction
young children do not understand the
difference between how something
appears to be, and how it really is
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Theory of the Mind
Ex: Cat named Maynard had a dog’s mask put on
his face. Children thought that Maynard was a
dog.
Change in appearance changed reality
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Mastering Theory of the Mind
Children must learn that
 Other people have thoughts different
from theirs
 All people have different thought
processes
Talking to children about thinking, feeling,
memory, etc. helps in the development of
a theory of the mind
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Language Development
From age 2 to age 6, children learn approximately 7 new
words every day.
How?
 Fast-mapping : the ability to learn a word after only one
exposure
 Syntactical bootstrapping : using what is known about
grammar to figure out meanings of new words
ex: Nina is pidding her food. action
Nina threw her pid.
object
 Imitation
 Reinforcement from adults
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Learning grammar
Children learn how to combine words and
form sentences gradually
where Daddy?
where Daddy is?
where is Daddy?
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Learning grammar
Around age 3, children begin to add word
endings such as –s, -ing, -ed
Overregularization : applying rules of
grammar and producing incorrect forms
of words
“foots”
“go-ed”
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Learning social rules of language
Social rules of discourse: conventions
(rules) that people use in
conversation with others
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turn taking
answer-obviousness – if answer to
question is obvious, the question is
actually a request or demand
“do you have to yell in the house?”
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Learning social rules of language
Rules of language differ between cultures
African Americans don’t use question
demands
How might an African American child
interpret,
“Must you jump on the bed?”
 Must take their turn and hold audiences
attention rather than waiting for someone
to finish and they are given their turn
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More than one language
Bilingual : fluent in two languages
Additive bilingualism : second language is learned
while first language is maintained
Subtractive bilingualism : second language is
learned while fluency in first language is lost
Simultaneous bilingualism : two languages are
learned at the same time, starting in infancy
Sequential bilingualism : one language is learned,
and then 2nd language is learned.
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More than one language
Children who begin learning 2nd language
before age 3 are usually just as fluent in
both languages.
Older learners have trouble with accent, but
learn vocabulary and grammar faster
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More than one language
In early stages, children may mix words
from both languages – frequency
decreases as each language gets
stronger
Children understand the difference
between the two languages and may
restrict use of each to specific situations,
but learn to switch back and forth easily
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Early Childhood Education
Project Head Start : federally funded
program begun in 1965 to improve
achievement in young children
Abecedarian Project : program to assess
impact of full time high quality
intervention beginning in infancy
High/Scope Perry Preschool : high quality
part-day intervention during school year
for 3 to 5 yr olds
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Effects of Early Education Programs
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immediate gain in IQ which fades during
elementary school
higher scores on reading and math tests
fewer students placed in special ed
classes
higher graduation rates
better overall health
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Effects of Early Education Programs
Adapted with permission from L.J. Schweinhart, H.V. Barnes, & D.P. Weikart. (1993). Significant benefits: The High/Scope Perry Preschool study
through age 27 (Monographs of the High/Scope Educational Research Foundation, Number 10); pp. xvi-xvii. Ypsilanti, MI: The High/Scope Press.)
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