MODULE

5
PIAGET’S STAGES OF
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

I. INTRODUCTION
Jean Piaget’s Cognitive Theory of Development is truly a classic in the field of
educational psychology. This theory fuelled other researches and theories of development
and learning. Its focus in on how individuals construct knowledge.

II. OBJECTIVES
 Describe Piaget’s stages in your own words.
 Conduct a simple Piagetian task interview with children.
 Match learning activities to the learners’ cognitive stage.

III. LEARNING ACTIVITIES

A. ENGAGE
Read and analyze the selection below.

It’s Christmas and Uncle Dan is giving “aguinaldo” to the children. Three year-old
Krezel did not want to receive the one hundred peso bill and instead preferred to
receive four 20 peso bills. Her ten year-old cousins were telling her it’s better to get
the one hundred bill, but they failed to convince her.

B. EXPLORE
Why do you think did Krezel prefer the 20-peso bills?
 C. EXPLAIN
JEAN PIAGET’S COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
For sixty years, Jean Piaget conducted research on cognitive development. His research
method involved observing a small number of individuals as they responded to cognitive tasks
that he designed. These tasks were later known as Piagetian tasks.
Piaget called his general theoretical framework "genetic epistemology" because he
was interested in how knowledge developed in human organisms. Piaget was initially into biology
and he also had a background in philosophy. Knowledge from both these disciplines influenced
his theories and research of child development. Out of his researches, Piaget came up with the
stages of cognitive development.
Piaget examined the implications of his theory not only to aspects of cognition but also
to intelligence and moral development. His theory has been applied widely to teaching
and curriculum design specially in the preschool and elementary curricula.

Basic Cognitive Concepts

Schema. Paget used the tem schema 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. It is like the mind has a filing cabinet and each
drawer has folders that contain files of things he has had an experience with. For instance, a child
sees a dog for the first time, he creates his own schema of what a dog is. It has four legs and a
tail. It barks. It’s fury. The child then puts this description of a dog of file in his mind. When he
sees another similar dog, he pulls out the file (his schema of a dog) in his mind, looks at the
animal, and says, “four legs, tail, barks, furry.... That's a dog!”

Assimilation. This is the process of fitting a new experience into an existing or previously
created cognitive structure or schema. If the child sees another dog, this time a little smaller one,
he would make sense of what he is seeing by adding this new information (a different-looking
dog) info his schema of a dog.

Accommodation. This is the process of creating a new schema. If the same child now
sees another animal that looks a little bit like a dog, but somehow different. He might try to not
fit into his schema of a dog, and say, “Look mommy, what a funny looking dog. Its bark is funny
too!” Then the mommy explains, “That’s not a funny looking dog. That’s a goat!” With mommy’s
further descriptions, the child will now create a new schema, that of a goat. He now adds a new
file in his filing cabinet.

Equilibration. Piaget believed that people have the 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. This means there is discrepancy between what is perceived and what is
understood. We then exert effort through assimilation and accommodation to establish
equilibrium once more.
 Piaget's Stages of Cognitive Development

Stage 1. Sensori-motor Stage. The first stage corresponds from birth to infancy. This is the
stage when a child who is initially reflexive in grasping, sucking and reaching becomes more
organized in his movement and activity. The term sensori-motor touches on the prominence of
the senses and muscle movement through which the infant comes to learn about himself and the
world. In working with children in the sensori-motor stage, teachers should aim to provide rich
and stimulating environment with appropriate objects to play with.

Object permanence. This is the ability of the child to know that an object still exists
even when out of sight. This ability is attained in the sensory motor stage.

Stage 2. Pre-Operational stage. The preoperational stage covers from about two to seven
years old, roughly corresponding to the preschool years. Intelligence at this stage is intuitive in
nature. At this stage, the child can now make mental representations and is able to pretend, the
child is now ever closer to the use of symbols. This stage is highlighted by the following:

Symbolic Function. This is the ability to represent objects and objects. A symbol is a
thing that represents something else. At around four years of age, Nico may pretend to drink
from an empty glass and turn the glass into a rocket ship or a telephone.

Egocentrism. This is the tendency of the child to only see his point of view and to assume
that everyone also has his same point of view. The child cannot take the perspective of others.
You see this in five year-old boy who buys a toy truck for his mother 's birthday. Or a three year
old girl who cannot understand why her cousins call her daddy "uncle" and not daddy.

Centration. This refers to the tendency of the child to only focus on one aspect of a thing
or event and exclude other aspects. For example, when a child is presented with two identical
glasses with the same amount of water, the child will say they have the same amount of water.
However, once water from one of the glasses is transferred to an obviously taller but narrower
glass, the child might say that there is more water in the taller glass.

Irreversibility. Pre-operational children still have the inability to reverse their thinking.
They can understand that 2+3 is 5, but cannot understand that 5-3 is 2.

Animism. This is the tendency of children to attribute human like traits or characteristics
to inanimate objects. When at night, the child is asked, where the sun is, she will reply, "Mr. Sun
is asleep.

Transductive reasoning. This refers to the pre-operational child's type of reasoning

that is neither inductive nor deductive. Reasoning appears to be from particular to particular. For
example, since her mommy comes home everyday around six o’clock in the evening, when asked
why it is already night, the child will say, "because my mom is already home.
Stage 3. Concrete-Operational Stage. This stage is characterrized by the ability of the child
to think logically but only in terms of concrete objects. This covers approximately the ages
between 8-11 years or the elementary school years. The concrete operational stage is marked
by the following:

Decentering. This refers to the ability of the child to perceive the different features of
objects and situations. No longer is the child focused or limited to one aspect or dimension. This
allows the child to be more logical when dealing with concrete objects and situations.

Reversibility. During the stage of concrete operations, child can now follow that certain
operations can be done in reverse. For example, they can already comprehend the commutative
property of addition, and that subtraction is the reverse of addition. They can also understand
that a ball of clay shaped into a dinosaur can again be rolled back into a ball of clay.

Conservation. This is the ability to know that certain properties of objects like number,
mass, volume, or area do not change even it there is a change in appearance. Because of the
development of the child's ability of decentering and also reversibility, the concrete operational
child can now judge rightly that the amount of water in a taller but narrower container is still the
same as when the water was in the shorter but wider glass. The children progress to attain
conservation abilities gradually beingg a pre-conserver, a transitional thinker and then a
conserver.

Seriation. This re fers to the ability to order or arrange things in a series based on one
dimension such as weight, volume or size.

Stage 4. Formal Operational Stage. In the final stage of formal operations covering ages
between 12 and 15 years, thinking becomes more logical. They can now solve abstract problems
and can hypothesize. This stage is characterized by the following:

Hypothetical Reasoning. This is the ability to come up with different hypothesis about
a problem and to gather and weigh data in order to make a final decision or judgment. This can
be done in the absence of concrete objects. The individuals can now deal with "What if questions.

Analogical reasoning. This is the ability to perceive the relationship in one instance and
then use that relationship to narrow down possible answers in another similar situation or
problem. The individual in the formal operations stage can make an analogy. If United Kingdom
is to Europe, then Philippines is to ______. The individual will reason that since the UK is found
in the continent of Europe then the Philippines is found in what continent? Then Asia is his answer.
Though reflective thought and even in the absence of concrete objects, the individual can now
understand relationships and do analogical reasoning.

Deductive Reasoning. This is the ability to think logically by applying a general rule to
a particular instance or situation. For example, all countries near the north pole have cold
temperatures. Greenland is near the North pole. Therefore, Greenland has cold temperature.
 D. ELABORATE
From Piaget's findings 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 (i.e., assimilation and accommodation).
3. Learning materials and 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.

E. EVALUATE
This activity focuses on a story involving the interaction of family members. Choose
a story you want to use for this activity. It can be from a story you have read or a
movie or “telenovela” that you watched or plan to watch. Use the matrix below to
relate the characters to Piaget’s stages of cognitive development.

Title of the Story / Movie:

Character Description Piagetian Connection
(What is his/her stage of cognitive development? Explain.)