Proving that our intelligence was inherent, however the research was found to be inaccurate. On the other hand, the nurture side of the discussion said that intelligence was learnt from the environment. Jean Piaget claimed that your intelligence is developed in stages as your brain matures and children are “little scientists “discovering their own knowledge via their environment. Another developmental stage that the nurture-nurture debate comes up in is language. The
His interest in children’s cognitive processes developed when he started to notice that children of similar ages made the same kinds of mistakes on test questions. After in depth research, Piaget developed the stages of cognitive development theory. This revolved around the idea that unlike adults, thinking and mental development of children changes qualitatively with age (Passer & Smith, 2013). In order to understand Piaget’s theory, it is important to understand its fundamental principles. The first, Piaget referred to using the term ‘schema’.
Kohlberg was concerned more with reasoning for each participant’s decision rather than their answer (Cherrie, 2012). Kohlberg’s research resulted in the following levels and stages of moral development; Level 1. Preconventional Morality • Stage 1 - Obedience and Punishment The earliest stage of moral development is especially common in young children, but adults are also capable of expressing this type of reasoning. At this stage, children see rules as fixed and absolute. Obeying the rules is important because it is a means to avoid punishment.
One of Vygotsky’s important ideas was his notion of the Zone of proximal development (ZPD). This refers to the gap between what children can accomplish on their own and what they can accomplish with the help of others who are more competent. Note that the word proximal means “nearby,” indicating that the assistance provided goes just slightly beyond the child’s current abilities. Such guidance can help “stretch” the Child’s cognitive abilities to new levels. Vygotsky defined the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) as the distance between the most difficult task a child can do alone and the most difficult task a child can do with help.
Piaget, Vygotsky, and Erikson offer different views of how a child’s mental abilities progress throughout their education. Piaget believed that children, at certain stages in their lives, regardless of intelligence, were not able to understand things in particular ways, simply because they were not old enough. He thought that development had to precede learning. Vygotsky, on the other hand, theorized that children acquire their level of intelligence by the culture they live in and that children learning different things helped them to develop intellectually. Erikson felt as if the environment played a major role in a child’s development and that every person goes through specific stages in their lives.
He noticed that young children's answers were qualitatively different than older children which suggested to him that the younger ones were not dumber (a quantitative position since as they got older and had more experiences they would get smarter) but, instead, answered the questions differently than their older peers because they thought differently.” (Educational, 2013) Because Piaget noticed the changes in the responses due to the ages of the children, he determined that there were there were four stages that formed his cognitive development theory. “The theory concerns the emergence and construction of schemata — schemes of how one perceives the world — in "developmental stages", times when children are acquiring new ways of mentally representing information.“ (Theory, 2013) He also believed that these four stages are not only based off of age, but also based off of two processes, which determine how we view our environment. “Piaget described two processes used by the individual in its attempt to adapt: assimilation and accommodation.” (Education, 2013) These processes are constantly used throughout the different
Vygotsky believed strongly that cognitive development is linked to input from others. Children will learn from each other if they are put into social groups with each other. The similarities or comparisons between the two are that they both believed that social interaction has an irreplaceable role in cognitive development, Vygotsky put more emphasis on the role of social interaction than did Piaget. B2: Compare and Contrast Stages of Development. When I
Jean Piaget Jean Piaget is a Swiss psychologist who has a theory on Children’s Cognitive (mental) development. Cognitive development is about the child developing and constructing a mental view of the world. Piaget has developed a theory that has been widely known and has changed how people view a child’s world and their thinking process. The focal point of his theory is that children need to be frequently interacting with their environment, this way they make mistakes and are able to learn from them, this is the bases of his theory. The theory is based on different levels on thinking, and no level has the same form of thinking as the others.
According to Piaget, morality develops with age meaning that as the child’s theory of mind develops they also develop the ability to make judgement on moral behaviour. Piaget’s theory is centred on stages on what he termed as developmental stages, but in relation to moral development he introduced new concept he termed moral orientation which he divided into two types. He called them the heteronomous and autonomous morality. During the heteronomous period a child follows set rules and they believe that these rules cannot be changed and during the autonomous period the child will start to believe that laws or rules can be changed and they will go on to set their own rules which they can follow and change them if need be (Gross, 2010. The results of the case study in Gross (2010) showed that in pro-social settings, Chinese children regard truth telling less positively and lying more positively in pro-social environment than children from Canada.
They are both constructivist, holding that children learn through constructing meaning with their world. Where these perspectives diverge is in how each child constructs knowledge, the role of the teacher and how imagination plays into development. There are many beliefs in common between Montessori’s and Froebel’s education philosophies. Both believe in the child's right to be active, explore and develop their own knowledge through investigation. Both see activity as a guide to education and do not believe in repressing it.