Jean Piaget!
This fellow had three definitions for cognitive processes.
I. Schema: a concept or framework to organize information.
A particular schema I have is for my crocheting. I learned the stitches and a whack of other things associated with crocheting. It's there in my mind, organized beautifully.
II. Assimilation: the new information being obtained fits unobtrusively in with what's already known.
When I was still acquiring my crocheting skills, there were many stitches I needed to learn. I learned the single crochet stitch, which is terribly basic and dull, and from there I learned the double, half double, and treble crochet stitches. These stitches were all variations of the single crochet, so they fit nicely within my previously constructed schema.
III. Accommodation: the new information doesn't fit into the schema, and requires that information be reorganized.
One day I decided that I was going to learn to knit. My husband dreamed of having a knitted argyle hat, so I set to learning this new skill in order to surprise him with a lovely hand-knit hat. I had to completely leave behind everything I knew about crocheting. I originally thought that it might fit into my schema, but I had to shuffle a bunch of things around. Instead of one hook, there are two or more needles. Loops can fall off and destroy your work, and it is terribly difficult to take stitches out. I was very surprised at how hard it was for me to pick up knitting. I had years of experience with crocheting, but it didn't prepare me for the challenge. I successfully learned to knit and surprised my husband with a lovely argyle hat.
A few more examples of this:
-I grew up in an amazing town in Ontario that was right on the vast and majestic Lake Huron. We were wonderfully close to the beautiful beach where I spent many warm, summer days. My younger brother, Josiah, was about 3 or 4 when my parents gave us all a warning about undertows. They weren't terribly common on our beach, but they happened enough to strike fear into the heart of my mother. We had our talk, and then we were released into the clear, blue waters. Josiah stood on the shore and fearfully asked my mother, "how big are undertoads?" It took some convincing to get him into the water again, but thankfully he accommodated this information into his schema and we had many good times in the water.
-A friend that I acquired on a trip to Panama told me a story from her childhood. She said that one day she was informed that it was physically impossible for a human to stand on a cloud. She said it was one of the saddest days in her child hood. She also had to accommodate this new information she had been given and alter her previous assumptions.
This Piaget guy also had four levels of development.
One: Sensorimotor
- from birth to around two years of age.
At this stage of infancy, there is no thinking involved. The children in this stage are simply feeling their way through their environments.
I have a nephew that is in this stage. My sister, Sherah, is ready to have her second child any day now, and her first boy is a whirling ball of energy. Their home is under some minor renovations and they are missing some cabinet doors in their kitchen. One day, Simeon grabbed the glass blender out of the lower cupboard. My sister saw this and instructed the boy to bring it to her. He must have known that bringing her the blender would end his fun with this dangerous toy, so instead he ran with it in the opposite direction. He can't think about what he is doing and he doesn't understand the danger that comes with playing with a blender. All he knows is that he wants it. Other than playing with the blender, he has always got his hands on something. When he finds himself naked, he's got two hands on his man-bits, and he doesn't know how inappropriate that is. He lacks the ability to think with any complexity.
Two. Preoperational
- two to seven years of age
My other nephew, Isaiah, is just shy of two years old and he fits nicely into this category. He is just beginning to use language to communicate with those around him. He'll pick up the phone and talk on it, and he'll repeat things he hears with a considerable amount of accuracy. He is also experiencing ego-centrism. His perspective is the same as everyone else's. When his lunch is late, the whole world stops and everyone may as well follow his example and bang their heads on things. All of his decisions are based on intuition. It's not logical to think that you can sit on an immobile lawn mower for hours on end, but Isaiah wants to do it. His mother takes him off and he is consumed with anger. He doesn't show his anger like most children, though. He glares and then sneaks in a good bite.
Three. Concrete operational
-seven to eleven years of age
Operational refers to mental operations that are reversible. At this stage, conservation is obtained. Conservation: the idea that some characteristic of an object stays the same even though the object might change in shape. The volume of water stays the same, even though the height and width of the glass holding it may change. These children need to have concrete physical objects in order to understand concepts. Often small objects will be found inside classrooms for these kids to work with. My school had small animals, and plastic teddy bears of different sizes and colors. Addition and subtraction can then be translated into physical objects. Three animals minus two animals leaves one animal behind. Therefore, 3 - 2 = 1. I remember a time when we were taught about ratios and each of us were given a bag of delicious jelly beans. I don't remember encountering any difficulty in understanding the concept, and I am fully convinced it was the jelly beans.
Four. Formal Operational
- eleven/fifteen years to adulthood
Here there is a move beyond concrete thinking towards abstract thinking. Syllogism is introduced here: 2 premises, wherein if the two premises are true, then the outcome will be true. An example provided in class: All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is a mortal.
Hypothetical deductive reasoning happens in this stage as well. Definition: the concepts that adolescents can develop hypotheses about ways to solve problems, and systematically reach conclusions. Due to the fact that these are adolescents, the conclusions reached are not always constructive. I shall use my father as an example. When he was an adolescent, he noticed that feed bags held air well. He also harbored enmity towards cats. (I'd like to point out that this story probably isn't going where you think it is). He would take a cat, gently place it in a feed sack, and he would attach a parachute made out of another feed sack. He would then climb up the silo and toss the hapless cats off. There were always a few guys at the bottom with a sheet just incase the chute didn't deploy, but it always did. I guess if there was a family of risky felines that lived on top of a silo, you would want to know that there is a quick and safe way to get them all to safety. My father saw that potential issue, and he successfully developed and tested a hypothesis, solving the problem.
Perhaps the most nauseating trait that comes about in this group is adolescent ego-centrism: the heightened self consciousness that is reflected in adolescents beliefs that others are as interested in them as they themselves are. The nausea arises when I think back to my own adolescent years, as I am thankfully subject to few adolescents these days. Every little thing that happened to me was a huge, monstrous deal, and everywhere I went, I knew that people were looking at me. I simply had to perform. I thank the Lord that I'm past that self-involved stage of my life, and I'm praying for patience when I have to see it happen in my own children.
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