Apart from his theory of interaction, Piaget proposed four stages of cognitive development which reflect the increasing sophistication of children’s thought. Key factors involved in going through these stages are biological maturation and interaction with the
environment. The first stage is “The Sensorimotor Stage” (0-2 yrs), the child only recognises and knows the world through immediate senses and actions. The child cannot distinguish between itself and the environment (egocentrism), also when the infant is not able to see or act on objects they immediately cease to exist (object permanence). The second stage is “The Pre-Operational Stage” (2-7 yrs), the child is still very egocentric as well as dominated by the external appearance of things. The infant is unable to classify things apart from the inability to think logically. The third stage which is “The Concrete Operational Stage” (7-11 yrs) the child has matured and its cognitive complexity allows it to perform logical operations, i.e. relationships between things. The weakness however is that the child is still unable to perform these logical operations without the aid and presence of objects which are needed, in other words the child must be able to see the things in front of them. The fourth and final stage is “The Formal Operational Stage” (11 yrs +), at this stage the mental structures in the child are so developed that it can think logically and rationalise without presence of objects, the infant can also solve and think about abstract, hypothetical problems never before encountered in a systematic and structured way.
Vygotsky who was a Russian psychologist had a different view on cognitive development than Piaget. He focused on the importance of social interaction and language rather than active discovery learning. He sees the whole process of cognitive development as being social in nature, he said: “we become ourselves through others”. First of all the infant responds to the world though its actions but the society gives meaning to those actions by social interaction. Cognitive development occurs when the child internalises these meanings provided by society. Perhaps the first advance is language itself as young children lack the ability of reasoning. When language becomes internalised it congregates with thought, they become one compared to earlier in the life of the infant when speech is just w way of communication. Vygotsky said: “thought becomes verbal and speech rational”, meaning language provides us the ability to reflect on our thoughts as well as directing and controlling them. Eventually language splits between the above mentioned functions as children develop an inner voice for thinking and reasoning and an articulate way of speech for communication also used to convey our thoughts. As we internalise language, we increase our ability to solve problems.
As previously explained Vygotsky stated that cognitive development is achieved by a dual construction of knowledge between the infant and society. He also stated that
children’s potential intellectual ability increases if working together with another person, an expert. This is how the “zone of proximal development”(ZPD) is defined. The ZPD defines immature functions which are in the process of maturation but are currently in an early stage.
Jerome Bruner was a cognitive scientist concerned with ways of representing or thinking about knowledge at different ages and not stages. He proposed three modes of representation which develop orderly and provides the child with the ability to think about the world in more complex ways, these all also exist in the adult and are not merely lost. The first mode is the “Enactive Mode” (0-1 yrs), babies are represented in this mode and how they try to understand the world through their actions. Knowledge is here stored in “muscle-memory” i.e., when we ride a bike the knowledge is enactive, meaning we cannot learn to ride a bicycle based on what people show or tell us, we have to try it ourselves. The second mode is the “Iconic Mode” (1-7 yrs), it represents knowledge that is visual or auditory (icons). Children in this mode can represent large amounts of data, i.e. if a child was asked how many windows there were in his house, the child would then visualise the house and count the windows. Children which are dominated by their iconic mode show difficulties in thinking beyond and further above images. They cannot categorise knowledge or understand the relationships between things. The third and final stage is the “Symbolic Mode” (7 yrs +), in this stage children have the ability to categorise objects and other types of information such as letters, numbers, words. The information can also be manipulated meaning reflected upon and analysed. Children are now able to think beyond images making the symbolic mode superior to the iconic.
The role of adults, according to Piaget in the cognitive development in children lies as a facilitator. Meaning adults are only supposed to assist the children in their active discovery learning, education should be student centred. Children should not be taught concepts which they are not ready to understand by adults. Piaget further implies that task should be chosen according to the interest of the child, so that it is self-motivating.
Piaget’s theory covers many aspects of cognitive development; however it is far from complete. First of all, Piaget describes the development with much detail but it is not really an explanation of it. Piaget also ignores important cognitive factors such as individual differences, memory span etc. He also underrated social influences, instead by concentrating on individual maturation and active discovery learning he neglected the importance of the role of society and language in facilitating the knowledge of children. However, there are also
strengths in his theory, first of all he has been the subject of much criticism which increased research in the field of cognition.
According to Vygotsky adults should assist children by contingently and continuously working together within the ZPD. He said that teaching occurs when assistance is offered at various points in the ZPD where it is required. Not merely a self-oriented process such as Piaget’s. Therefore adults are very important to children’s cognitive development according to Vygotsky.
Bruner however provided valuable information to the understanding of cognitive development and the way it is applied to education. He agreed with Piaget that it occurs through interaction with the world but he also took into account how knowledge was represented and organised, he therefore proposed different modes of representation. Bruner also emphasized how important social factors are in cognitive development in children, especially language and social interaction. He specifically pointed out that education and social interaction was a crucial part of cognition. Unlike Piaget who had a view on language as being a mere tool in understanding symbolic cognitive structures Bruner believed that language is a symbolic logical operational thought, these are inseparable. Therefore to further increase and speed up cognitive development language training is important. This is ignored and rejected by Piaget since he believed that cognitive structures could only be developed though individual maturation and interaction.
Unlike Piaget who looked upon the adult/teacher as merely a facilitator for individual maturation, Bruner believed that the adult should constantly intervene and aid the child. Instructing the child is according to him an important part of the learning process.
In Conclusion, the three above mentioned theories have their specific strengths and weaknesses. Perhaps by combing these theories, by using the strengths of each one, the role of adults as facilitators in children’s cognitive development could become more apparent.
