What stages of development do the two children appear to be in? How would Piaget explain what is happening here?
What sort of techniques could you use to teach each child? Why must the techniques differ?
The first child is in the pre operational stage. It is apparent that he is only capable of one-way thinking. He has grasped the concept that if a hard object hits a glass, it will break, whereas a soft object will not have an effect on the glass. Even though the adult at the table explicitly tells him that a feather will break a glass, he cannot connect this statement to the following question. He resorts to his previous logic that a feather (a soft object) cannot break a glass. I believe the second child is in the formal operational stage. She understands the rules of the scenario given to her, which shows abstract reasoning and can consider incompatibilities.
These children would need to be taught in very different manners. The more developed child will be able to use abstract reasoning and problem solving methods, and should be challenged by these in an educational setting. The less developed child still needs to learn a lot of things, so his curriculum is going to be much more suited to his age and level of development. Things the second child would find rudimentary will challenge the first child. His education will also focus much more on interaction with others. He is currently in a very egocentric point of development; as he spends time in the classroom with children his own age, this thinking will start to change.
I agree that the second child is in the formal operational stage, mainly, because she can think hypothetically (in the logical scenario). The first child may be in the preoperational stage (from what you say, and also that he displays centration--he cannot simultaneosly hold his previous experience of a hammer or feather with the new kind of meaning of hammer or feather the researcher is presenting to him). How can you tell that he is not in concrete operations? (He IS representing the two objects when they are not physically in front of him?)
ReplyDeleteI like your description of the separate interventions. Remember that, according to Piaget, you cannot force a child to the next stage of development (this just happens with time). You should give each child a stage appropriate task that will induce disequilibrium.