Educational Psychology Theories of Development

1. Educational PsychologyTheories of Development Cognitive and Social Development

2. Two Big Ideas • Nature vs. Nurture • Which drives development? • Impossible to separate influences; both are critical • Continuity vs. Discontinuity • Continuous - Development is gradual change. • Discontinuous - Development occurs in stages.

3. Intellectual Development

4. Questions for this Module: • How did Piaget view cognitive development? • How is Piaget’s work viewed today? • How did Vygotsky view cognitive development? • How do the theories of Piaget and Vygotsky compare?

5. Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development Cognitive development the process by which a child’s understanding of the world changes as a function of age and experience

6. Jean Piaget (1896-1980) • Piaget was a Swiss psychologist is one of the 20th centuries most influential researchers in the area of developmental psychology. • Piaget’s body of research focused on ways in which children’s development progresses as they grow older. Video Clip of Piaget

7. Piaget’s Research • While working in Binet’s test lab (of IQ test fame) in Paris, Piaget became interested in how children think. • He noticed that young children's answers were qualitatively different than older children. • This suggested to him that the younger children were not less knowledgeable but, instead, answered the questions differently than their older peers because they thought differently. • He spent thousands of hours observing and writing about children in the early and middle 20th century

8. Piaget’s Ideas Piaget is best known for two major ideas that serve as fundamentals of educational psychology: Organizational structure of the mind Stages of childhood development

9. Piaget’s Organization Hypothesized learning is an on-going process of taking in and organizing new information The mind is a network of nodes connected by links (much like neurons) that, together, function as frameworks for experiences and expectations. He called these schema. Schemata (plural of schema) are like “scripts” for our beliefs about certain situations They are adaptive and help us function both in new and in frequent experiences

10. Piaget’s Organization Assimilation – fitting new information into existing schema Accommodation – altering schema or creating new schema to fit new material Equilibration – search for balance between existing schemata and new input Disequilibrium – lack of balance between existing schemata and new input Piaget hypothesized disequilibrium motivates us to engage in learning and work to establish equilibrium by means of accommodation.

12. Piaget’s View of Cognitive Development • Schema • Adaptation • Assimilation • Accommodation • Equilibration • Contructivism

14. Sensorimotor Stage • Sensorimotor stage: Birth to 2 years • child has little competence in representing the environment using images, language, or other symbols • Object permanence • The awareness that objects- and people- continue to exist even if they are out of sight • Global • Imitation • Object Permanence • Everything goes in the mouth

15. Preoperational Stage • Preoperational Stage: 2 to 7 years • Language development • Egocentric thought • child views the world entirely from his or her own perspective • Principle of conservation • the knowledge that quantity is unrelated to the arrangement and physical appearance of objects • Concrete, Static, Irreversible, Absolute Conservation Movie

16. Concrete Operational Stage • Concrete operational stage: 7 to 12 years • Logical thought • Loss of egocentrism • Concrete • Dynamic • Reversible • Reciprocity • Relational

17. Formal Operational Formal operational stage: 12 years to adulthood • Abstract thought • Deductive • Hypothetical Situations • Systematic Reasoning • Monitored Reasoning • Symbolic Thinking

18. Educational Implications • Active discovery vs. passive reception • Intrinsic Motivation is important • Practical learning situations • Elaboration not acceleration • Develop formal operational thinking • Major goals of education creative & critical thinking • Select materials and activities appropriate to students’ comprehension abilities • Knowledge is constructed • Children must interact with reality in order to learn. Opportunities to manipulate (e.g. play) and apply classroom material is critical.

19. Implications for Teaching • Developmentally Appropriate Education • Importance of Process • Active Learning • Self-Initiated Learning • Individual Learning Needs • Deemphasize Attempts to Make Children Adult like in Their Thinking

20. Criticisms of Piaget • Age-stage approximations invalid • Tasks can be taught earlier • Equilibration not necessary for development • Too much emphasis on biology • Insufficient appreciation for instruction • Development depends on the task • Development influenced by experience • Limitations of stage model • What comes after formal operations?

21. Sociocultural Theory • Information is passed in two phases: • Inter-psychologically • and then Intra-psychologically • Experiences are co-constructed; both the teacher and the learner participate in the process of knowledge acquisition or construction

22. Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934) Russian psychologist much of whose work was suppressed until the dissolution of the USSR Focused on sociocultural theory, the idea that all development takes place in social settings and is therefore influenced by social forces Developed theories as he worked to improve his own teaching and looked for ideas that might help explain and guide his experiences as an educator

23. Lev Vygotsky’s View of Cognitive Development Children actively construct their knowledge Social interaction and culture guide cognitive development Learning is based upon inventions of society Knowledge is created through interactions with other people and objects in the culture Less skilled persons learn from the more skilled Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) the level at which a child can almost, but not fully, comprehend or perform a task on his or her own

24. Vygotsky’s Key Ideas • Historical and Cultural Contexts • Cultural Tools (social learning) • How Development Occurs: • Learning Precedes Development • Acquisition of Signs with Help of More Experienced Others • Internalization of Signs (Sign Systems • Autonomous Problem Solving (Self-regulation)

25. Scaffolding “Scaffolding” is the work required by the expert necessary to bring the learner from that which they are capable of doing alone to that which they are capable of doing with assistance. The assistance tapers off this aid as it becomes unnecessary.

26. Zone of Proximal Development • The Zone of Proximal development is known as the ZPD or Zo-Ped (common in Europe) • The mentor scaffolds learning and the learner develops new knowledge using developmentally appropriate learning tasks. • Vygotsky called the difference between what a child can do with help and what he or she can do without guidance the "zone of proximal development" (ZPD). http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/students/learning/lr1zpda.htm

27. Zone of Proximal Development

28. Implications for Teaching • Embed learning activities in culturally authentic contexts. • Involve students in social interactions, and encourage students to use language to describe their developing understanding. • Create learning activities that are in learners’ zones of proximal development. • Provide instructional scaffolding to assist learning and development.

29. Applications of Vygotsky’s Theory • Provide Cooperative Learning • Activities Among Students with Different Ability Levels

30. Role of Social Interaction Piaget: Disequilibrium is the key to learning. Vygotsky: Encounters with more experienced people (experts) is key to learning. Piaget: Peer-to-peer interaction is the best source of motivation to learn. Vygotsky: Adult or older person-to-child interactions as ideal sources of learning.

31. Comparing Piaget and Vygotsky’s Theories Piagetian Ideas: • Four discrete stages • Cognitive development is limited by stages • Young children are schematic • Motivation to maintain cognitive equilibrium • Development occurs when assimilation is not possible (adaptation) Vygotsky's ideas: • Continuous development (no stages) • Zone of proximal development • Socially transmitted knowledge (cooperative learning and Scaffolding) • Private speech helps internalize knowledge • Both were constructivists • Both believed that social forces set the limits of development

32. Review Piaget and Vygotsky suggest a paradigm of cognitive development through physical and social stimulation. Cognitive development requires sensory stimulation; high variability in sensory experiences leads to high levels of cognitive development.