Piaget Blog Post 1

This module focused on the theory of cognitive development through the ideas of Piaget. The reading explained how individuals construct knowledge, whether it is independently or through social context. Piaget describes cognitive development through four stages, known as sensorimotor, pre-operational, concrete operational, and formal operational. Through these stages, individuals experience a change in thinking. In the sensorimotor stage, infants create knowledge from the sensory and motor experiences that they have. Then, in the pre-operational stage, children start to form mental representations, but their thinking is only one-way. They can only view the world from their perspective. Operations develop more in depth in the concrete operational stage, where children can think logically and learn to be able to reverse their thinking. Finally, formal operational individuals can mentally change abstract concepts. Their thinking is more in depth and realistic. Piaget's theory of maturation changes and develops as these stages in an individual begin to change as well. Individuals have more social interactions and active exploration while evolving through the four stages. On the other hand, Vygotskyy has a different argument for cognitive development. He developed the idea of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD), which is the difference between children's actual development level and their level of potential development. As a child works with an older individual and the adult provides scaffolding, the child will gradually gain more skill with the task. Piaget argued that development precedes learning, while Vygotsky argued that learning in school helps development to gradually move to a new level. However, both theorists emphasize the importance of play and the role of language. Finally, the module discussed how teachers can use these theories to help with curriculum and instruction. Teacher need to consider the level of thinking of the individual students when creating curricula because students will only benefit if their experiences are within their reach on a cognitive level.

One question that I have about this module is, what is an effective way to evaluate what the cognitive level of our students are without using standardized testing?

According to Piaget, the difference between development and learning is that development involves inquiring concepts spontaneously through experiences and learning involves applying the newly developed cognitive structures to new situations. Piaget believes that development precedes learning because an individual must be developmentally ready to learn. The stage in which a child is developing determines what and how much he or she can learn from instruction. It is essential to know a child's current stage before we can know what it is possible to teach that child. It is a little bit different from what a brain researcher would say because they would explain that learning can only occur if there is development and development is only occurring in the brain from genetics and environmental stimuli. Learning is the connection of neurons and how strong/powerful those connections are.

I think that Piaget would support young children learning how to search for information or design through media tools because those children are learning on their own and using critical thinking in their own beneficial way. Media tools are becoming a new way of learning and exploring and if children are doing this on their own and exploring these tools, they are able to form more concrete ideas through the information that they find.