-This module did make sense to me. It discussed the levels and different views of children's mental development. There were two main views that were shown, that of Piaget and that of Vygotsky. They talked about how development was different between the way it is constructed individually and socially. Piaget was more interested in how learning and meaning was constructed by the individual while still keeping in mind the social environment. Vygotsky on the other hand was more interested in how the acquisition of knowledge wasn't only an individual but a social process. Piaget believed that development came from a combo of your genetics and the learning environment in which you have to interact in. He proposed a stage model with four stages on the way to formal operational reasoning, or what he believed to be the apex of cognitive development. The stages are sensorimotor: where infants are exploring objects in their world and learning about object permanence; pre-operational: where children start to show concentration but can't take part in two-way thinking and are ego-centric because they can't handle more than one way of looking at something; concrete operational where children can start to use objects to form logical conclusions; and formal operational: children develop their own way of thinking that helps them solve problems. Vygotsky believed development came from a Zone of Proximal Development where they interact with a more experienced and developed partner to improve their own cognition. This was shown in a metaphor of scaffolding where the more developed helps the child through until the processes become internalized and they withdraw the scaffolding.
-One of my unanswered questions is what really does come first, development or learning? I know that Piaget and Vygotsky went back forth in their research about it and it seems to me like the debate about the chicken and the egg. I think it's fascinating that the brain is so complex and even though we know so much, we still really don't know that much about the brain for certain.
-According to Piaget development comes before learning because in order to learn, than a child must be developmentally ready. Therefore, teachers must have material that is developmentally appropriate for their children or must be able to break something down into things that are developmentally appropriate for their children's level. Development and learning are related because development comes from gaining new concepts through experience while learning is using those concepts to new situations. A child's movement from stage to stage is a continuous process of how they adapt to cognitive structures and develop new skills because of what they accomplish in the last stage. Development is happening when a child gets a concept because of an experience that they had while learning is the application of that new concept to a new situation.
I think you're confusing the ideas of development and learning, particularly for the Piagetian theory. Development happens through age (roughly) according to a Piagetian theorist--it's when you're 'ready' or have the capacity to think in particular ways. Piaget thought 'thinking like a child' was FUNDAMENTALLY different from 'thinking like an adult'.
ReplyDeleteLearning, according to Piaget, does happen when you apply your previous schemes or cognitive structures to new experiences, but it happens through the mechanism of disequilibrium, accomodation or assimilation, and then equilibrium.... Review that part, but that is how Piaget believes people learn. So, as long as they are capable of thinking about it (in the right stage) it's beneficial to show children something that will cause disequilibrium. Does that make sense?
To address your question, just think about what we've learned about the brain. We discussed how development and learning happen, and you read about critical periods. How would a brain researcher answer the question? It's not black and white....
The brain does have a set developmental path, and critical periods, but this is always influenced by experience (learning).