Stage | Age | Description |
Sensorimotor | Occurs between Birth and age 2. Child can construct an understanding of the world by coordinating sensory experiences with physical actions, progresses from reflexive and instinctual action to the beginning of symbolic thought, begins to develop object permanence and motor skills, has little to no capacity for symbolic representation and has an absence of language. | Child begins to understand that during a game of peek - a - boo, the person has not disappeared. This is the beginning of object permanence |
Preoperational | Occurs between ages two and seven. The child represents the world with words and images, has increased symbolic thinking, develops language, has egocentric thinking, and begins to understand the principle of conservation. This stage has two sub stages: preconceptual thinking and period of intuitive thought. | During this stage, a child understands that a ball is a ball. The child associates the word "ball" with the image of a ball. |
Concrete Operational | Occurs between the ages of seven and eleven. The child can reason logically about concrete events, can classify objects into sets, masters the principle of conservation, and understands the concept of reversibility | The child sees two rows of four quarters each. Row one has the quarters close together but the second row has a space between the coins. The child is able to understand that both rows have the same amount of coins despite the spacing. |
Formal Operational | Occurs from age eleven and through adulthood. The child can reason in more abstract, idealistic, and logical ways, can entertain possibilities of the future, and is more systematic in problem solving. | The child is able to work through algebra problems. |
Olson, M.
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