Cognition
refers to thinking and memory processes, and cognitive development refers to
long- term of changes in these processes. One of the most widely known
perspectives about cognitive development is the cognitive stage theory of a
Swiss psychologist named Jean Piaget. Piaget created and studied an account of
how children and youth gradually become able to think logically and
scientifically.
The goal of the
theory is to explain the mechanisms and processes by which the infant, and then
the child, develops into an individual who can reason and think using
hypotheses.
Piaget's Key Ideas
Schemas as “units” of
knowledge, each relating to one aspect of the world, including objects, actions
and abstract (i.e. theoretical) concepts.
When a child's existing
schemas are capable of explaining what it can perceive around it, it is said to
be in a state of equilibrium, i.e. a state of cognitive (i.e. mental) balance.
Piaget emphasized the
importance of schemas in cognitive development, and described how they were
developed or acquired. A schema can be defined as a set of linked mental
representations of the world, which we use both to understand and to respond to
situations. The assumption is that we store these mental representations and
apply them when needed.
A child's
cognitive development is about a child developing or constructing a mental
model of the world.
Imagine what it
would be like if you did not have a mental model of your world. It would mean that you would not be able to
make so much use of information from your past experience, or to plan future
actions.
To Piaget,
cognitive development was a progressive reorganization of mental processes as a
result of biological maturation and environmental experience. Children
construct an understanding of the world around them, then experience
discrepancies between what they already know and what they discover in their
environment. Jean Piaget was interested both in how children learnt and in how
they thought.
We as future
teachers need to understand that children learn better when they are involved
in the teaching-learning process, and this can be achieved it if we permit them
to know and construct their own knowledge through act on object. Children need to explore, to manipulate, to
experiment. This provides them knowledge
of those objects. This process enables the child to form schema, but it does
not mean what child will do what he wants .The teacher should be able to evaluate
the level of the child's development, so suitable tasks can be set. The
instruction should be individualized as much as possible in order
children have more opportunities
to communicate with one another, so teachers become facilitators of knowledge; they are a guide to
stimulate students. Allow children to make mistakes and learn from them.
