Cognative Thinking

Essay by EssaySwap ContributorCollege, Undergraduate February 2008

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A psychologist by the name of Jean Piaget developed a theory that all cognative abilities take place during the first two years in life. Piaget examined the actions and development of young children. Piaget developed a theory that consists of four cognitive development stages: Sensorimotor Stage, Preoperational stage, Concrete Operational Stage, and Formal Operational Stage.

The first development stage is the Sensorimotor Stage, in this stage the ages range from birth until about the age of two years. At six and seven months an activity for the children would be playing with a colorful mobile because children are beginning to see the world in color and perception. At ages eight to twelve months an activity would be a cube that has shapes cut out and the child has the same shapes in his or her hand and has to match them with the cut out shape on the cube.

This activity is affective because children are learning to recognize dimensions of objects. Age twelve to twenty-four months is the second half of the sensory motor stage. The children begin to walk, talk, and do simple logic. An activity for that age level would be to have stories read to them or for them to play with puzzles. Hide and Seek would be another activity because at that age when someone walks out of the room they like to go and find them to see where they went.

The second stage is the Preoperational stage. At age two through seven the children begin to represent the world symbolically. An activity for that age group would be to play school and have the child be the teacher and his or her stuffed animals are the students. The kids who fall into this stage are egocentric because they think the world revolves...