The Four Stages of Cognitive Development
How Piaget said children think and learn: schemas, assimilation and accommodation, and the four stages from sensorimotor to formal operational, including conservation and egocentricity.
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How children think
Piaget studied how children think and learn. He said children build mental frameworks called schemas, and update them by assimilation and accommodation. He also said children pass through four stages of cognitive development, each with its own way of thinking.
Words for the theory
Learn these four terms before you study the stages.
Two of the stages
Children think in different ways as they grow.
What a child can and cannot do
To reach the top grades, link each stage to what a child can and cannot yet do, such as a pre-operational child failing a conservation task, rather than just naming the stages.
Match the stage to the child
- sensorimotor
- pre-operational
- concrete operational
- formal operational
- learns through the senses and movement
- uses language but is egocentric and cannot conserve
- thinks logically about concrete objects and can conserve
- thinks in abstract and hypothetical ways
Match the term to its meaning
- schema
- assimilation
- accommodation
- egocentricity
- a mental framework for organising knowledge
- fitting new information into an existing schema
- changing a schema to fit new information
- seeing the world only from your own viewpoint
What is conservation?
What is conservation in this theory?
- Knowing that quantity stays the same even if its appearance changes.
- Protecting the natural environment.
- Remembering information for a long time.
- Knowing that an object still exists when it is out of sight.
Key processes
Select the TWO key processes in the theory.
- Assimilation.
- Accommodation.
- Rehearsal.
- Attachment.
Order the stages
Put the four stages in order, earliest first.
- Sensorimotor, from birth to about 2
- Pre-operational, about 2 to 7
- Concrete operational, about 7 to 11
- Formal operational, about 11 and older
Summarise the theory
Piaget said children build mental frameworks called _____. They add new information by _____ or change a framework by _____. In the pre-operational stage a child is _____ and cannot conserve. By the concrete operational stage the child can _____.
Name the age
A child usually reaches the concrete operational stage at about what age in years?
Spot the pre-operational features
Tap the TWO features of a pre-operational child.
- is egocentric
- cannot conserve
- thinks in abstract ways
- reasons about hypotheticals
- understands conservation
Which stage?
Decide which stage the child is in.
- A baby explores toys by putting them in its mouth
- A child of five thinks a tall glass holds more than a wide one
- A teenager can reason about hypothetical situations
Explain a stage
Explain one of the stages of cognitive development. Name the stage, give its rough age range, and describe what a child can and cannot yet do.
- Name the stage and its age range
- Describe what the child can do
- Describe what the child cannot yet do