Qualification: Level 3 Diploma for the Early Years Educator
Unit: Unit 3.9: Facilitate the cognitive development of children
Learning outcome: 2 Understand theory underpinning cognitive development
Assessment criteria: 2.1 Describe theoretical perspectives in relation to cognitive development
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- Piaget
- 4 stages of cognitive development:
- Sensorimotor (0-2 years) – children learn from sensory input and experience, learn that they are separate from other things and learn object permanence
- Preoperational (2-7 years) – egocentricism, learn symbols/words
- Concrete Operational (7-11 years) – develop logic and reasoning, understand concept of conservatism, begin ro see things from the perspective of others
- Formal Operational (12+) – understand abstract and hypothetical problems, increase in logic and reason
- Schemas – used to describe how children formulate ideas based on experience
- Assimilation – child processes information (e.g. a child sees a herd of cows and and can describe them as large, slow, noisy and brown)
- Accommodation – schema changes based on new information (e.g. a child sees a cow running and changes their schema so that they are no longer classed as slow or sees a black and white cow and realises all cows are not brown)
- 4 stages of cognitive development:
- Vygotsky
- Social interaction is important to the development of a child’s cognition
- Zone of proximal development – children can only learn up to a certain point independently, after which they require adults or peers to introduce further concepts
- Bandura
- Social Cognitive Theory – children learn by observing and copying others (modelling)
- Skinner
- Positive and negative reinforcement support children’s learning
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