Piaget’s Stages of Development

EPS 380
Final Review & Objectives

Piaget’s Stages of Development

|Sensorimotor Stage |Preoperational Stage |Concrete Operational |Formal Operational |
|Birth – 2 |Age 2 – 7 |Age 7 – 11 |11 - Adulthood |
|Reflexes |Conservation |Inferred Reality |Hypothetical Situations |
|Object permanence |Centration |Seriation |Systematic Reasoning |
| |Reversibility |Class Inclusion |Symbolic Thinking |
| |Egocentric |Transitivity | |

Criticisms of Piaget:
1. It is based on naturalistic observation not scientific experimentation.
2. Explanatory mechanisms like schemes, assimilation, disequilibrium etc. are unobservable and appear to be explanatory fictions.
3. The theory deals only with the “cognitive domain”.
4. The theory is not parsimonious since it uses mental events as key components in the theory.
5. Predictions about the time periods in which skills should be learned have frequently been incorrect.
6. Piaget underestimated the effect of environmental variables on the acquisition of cognitive abilities.
7. Piaget’s view that children construct their own knowledge violates determinism since children are made the cause of their own behavior. This is a version of free will.
8. The theory fails to incorporate a large body of scientific facts coming from the experimental analysis of behavior that are inconsistent with the theory.

Vygotsky

|Self-Regulation |Private Speech |Zone of Proximal Development |Scaffolding |
|The ability to solve problems |Children’s self-talk – guides |Level of development immediately |Gradually decreasing support for |
|without the help of others |actions. |above a person’s present level |learning and problem solving |
| |External to internal | | |
|Independent thinking and learning | |Ability to do tasks with minimal | |
| | |help but could not do by self | |
|Sign System | | | |
|Symbols created by cultures. Help | | | |
|people think, communicate and solve| | | |
|problems (language, writing, | | | |
|numbers, math) | | | |

Erikson
Stages of Personal and Social Development
|STAGE |AGE |GOAL |CRISIS |
|Stage I |Birth – 18 mos | | |
|Stage II |18 mos – 3 yrs | | |
|Stage III |3 – 6 | | |
|Stage IV |6 – 12 | | |
|Stage V |12 – 18 | | |
|Stage VI |Young Adulthood | | |
|Stage VII |Middle Adulthood | | |
|Stave VIII |Late Adulthood | | |