Child and

Adolescent
Development
Looking at Learners at Different
Life Stages

EDUC 50
 UNIT 1: BASIC CONCEPTS AND ISSUES ON
HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
Part I: Introduction

Module 6: Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Abstraction
Jean Piaget conducted research on cognitive development for 60 years. His method involved
observing small number of individuals as they responded to cognitive tasks that he designed that
were known as Piagetian tasks.
He called his general theoretical framework “genetic epistemology” because he was
interested in how knowledge developed in human organisms, as he was initially into biology and
had a background in philosophy that influenced his theories and research of child development.
He examined the implications of his theory not only to aspects of cognition but also to
intelligence and moral development.

Basic Cognitive Concepts

Schema. He used this term to refer to the cognitive structures by which individuals
intellectually adapt to and organize their environment. It is an individual’s way to understand or
create meaning about a thing or experience. Like creating a drawer in our mind filled with
folders containing information of things we had experienced. For a child that saw a dog for the
first time, he creates his own schema of what a dog is, has four legs, tail, furry and barks. He’ll
put that description into a folder about dogs in his mind. So when he sees another four legged,
has tail, furry and barks, he’ll pull out his own schema (file) of dogs and know that what he sees
now is also a dog.
Assimilation. The process of fitting a new experience into an existing or previously created
cognitive structure or schema. If the child sees another dog, much smaller, he would make sense
of what he is seeing by adding this new information (a different looking dog) into his schema of
a dog.
Accommodation. The process of creating a new schema. If the same child sees another
animal that looks like like a dog but is somehow different. He might try to fit it into his schema
of the dog and when pointed as a dog, adults around will try to clear that misunderstanding by
saying that it is not a dog but a different animal, the child will then create another schema for the
new animal he saw.
 Equilibration . Piaget believed that people have natural need to understand how the world
works and to find order, structure and predictability in their life. Equilibration is achieving
proper balance between assimilation and accommodation. When our experiences do not match
our schemata (plural of schema) or cognitive structures, we experience cognitive disequilibrium.
Meaning, there is a discrepancy between what is perceived and what is understood, so exert
effort through assimilation and accommodation to establish equilibrium again.
Cognitive development involves a continuous effort to adapt to the environment in terms of
assimilation and accommodation. In this sense, Piaget’s theory is similar in nature to Bruner
and Vygotsky’s constructivist perspectives of learning.

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Stage 1: Sensori-motor Stage
Children think as a result of coordination of sensory input and motor responses.
Birth to infancy (18 months). Stage when the child is initially reflexive in grasping,
sucking and reaching becomes more organized in his movement. The term sensori-motor
focuses on the prominence of the senses and muscle movement which the infant learns. One
should aim to provide rich and stimulating environment with appropriate objects to play
with for the child.
A. Object permanence. The ability of the child to know that an object still exists
even when out of sight, this is attained in sensory motor stage.

Stage 2: Pre-Operational Stage

Or intuitive stage is where thinkers can now symbolize or mentally represent their
world.
2 to 7 years old. Intelligence at this stage is intuitive in nature. The child can now make
mental representations and is able to pretend, the child is now ever closer to the use of
symbols.the stage is highlighted by the following:
A. Symbolic Function - ability to represent objects and events. A symbol is a
thing that represents something else. A 2 year old may pretend to drink from an empty
glass. At 4 years old, the glass turns into a rocket ship or train. By 6 or 7 years, the child
can pretend to play with objects only in his mind.
B. Egocentrism - tendency of the child to only see his point of view and to
assume everyone else has his same point of view. The child cannot take the perspective
of others.
 C. Centration - tendency of the child to only focus on one aspect of a thing or
event and exclude other aspects. A child presented with marbles and two similar boxes,
given that the marble was placed in one box that is wider and then transferred to a box
much narrower, he will only focus on the aspect the the narrow box has more marbles
than the wider one, excluding the fact that the same marbles were just transferred from
one box to another.
D. Irreversibility - children in this stage will be unable to reverse their thinking.
They can understand that 6+3=9 but cannot understand that 9-6=3 or 9-3=6.
E. Animism - tendency of the child to attribute human traits to inanimate objects.
Like saying that “Mr. Pillows need some rest”
F. Transductive Reasoning - refers to the pre-operational child’s type or
reasoning that is neither inductive (specific to generalized conclusion) nor deductive
(generalized principle for a specific conclusion). Reasoning appears to be from
particular to particular, if A causes B, then B causes A. If the child is used to showering
under the rain, then suddenly asked why he’s not taking a bath yet, he will say it’s
because there is no rain yet.

Stage 3: Concrete-Operational Stage

Mathematical operations develop.
7-8 to 11 years old. A child is able to think logically but only in terms of concrete
objects. The stage is marked by the following:
A. Decentering - ability of the child to perceive the different features of objects
and situations. The child is no longer focused or limited to one aspect or dimension.
Allows the child to be more logical when dealing with concrete objects and situations.
B. Reversibility - the child can now follow that certain operations can be done in
reverse.
C. Conservation - ability to know that certain properties of objects like number,
mass, volume or area do not change even if there is a change in appearance. The child
can now judge rightly that the amount of marbles in both boxes is still the same. The
children progress to attain conservation abilities gradually being a pre-conserver, a
transitional thinker and then a conserver.
D. Seriation - ability to order or arrange things in a series based on one dimension
such as weight, volume or size.
Stage 4: Formal Operational Stage
Thinkers can handle hypothetical problems. Scientific reasoning is possible.
11-12 to 15 years old. Thinking becomes more logical, they can now solve abstract
problems and can hypothesize. The stage is characterized by the following:
A. Hypothetical Reasoning - ability to come up with different hypothesis about
a problem and to gather and weigh data in order to make a final decision or judgement.
Can be done in absence of concrete objects and can now deal with “what if” questions.

B. Analogical Reasoning - ability to perceive the relationship in one instance and

the use that relationship to narrow down possible answers in another similar situation or
problem. They can answer analogies like, if h2o is to water, then co2 is to carbon
dioxide and much simpler analogies.

C. Deductive Reasoning - ability to think logically by applying a general rule to a

particular instance or situation. Like, anything denser than water will sink, apple is less
dense so it will float.

From Piaget’s finding and comprehensive theory, we can derive the following principles:
1. Children will provide different explanations of reality at different stages of cognitive
development
2. Cognitive development is facilitated by providing activities or situations that engage
learners and require adaptation (assimilation and accommodation.
3. Learning materials or mental activities should involve the appropriate level of motor
or mental operations for a child of given age; avoid asking students to perform tasks that are
beyond their current cognitive capabilities.
4. Use teaching methods that actively involve students and present challenges.