Theories of Development Piaget and Vygotsky

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Theories of Development Piaget and Vygotsky

• Edwin D. Bell
• Winston-Salem State University

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Topics

• Aspects/issues of development
• Piaget
• Vygotsky

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Human Development

• Refers to how and why people grow and adapt, and
  change over the course of their lifetimes.
• One of the first requirements of effective
  teaching is that teachers understand how students
  think and how they view the world.

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Issues of Development

• Nature vs nurture is development predetermined
  at birth, by heredity and biological factors, or
  is it affected by experience and other
  environmental factors.
• Continuous and discontinuous theories how
  change occurs.

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Piagets Basic Assumptions

• Children are active and motivated learners,
  i.e., they naturally curious about their world
  (Ormrod, 2008).
• Children construct knowledge from their
  experiences (constructivism)
• Iteractions with the physical and social
  environment is critical for cognitive growth
  (Ormrod, 2008)

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Piaget Theory of Cognitive Development

• Constructivism
• Schemes (schemata) patterns of behavior and
  thinking.
• Adaptation/learning is the process of adjusting
  schemes to the environment by means of
  assimilation and accommodation Ormrod, 2008,
  Slavin, 2003).

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Assimilation

• Is the process of understanding a new object or
  event in terms an existing schema Ormrod, 2008)

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Accommodation

• Is modifying an existing scheme in light of new
  information, or
• Creating a a new scheme (Ormrond, 2008)

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Equilibration

• Situations that cannot be handled by existing
  schemes produce a disequilibrium. Restoring
  balance is called equilibration. According to
  Piaget learning depends on this process (Slavin,
  2003).

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Piagets Stages of Cognitive Development

• Sensorimotor Birth to 2 years
• Preoperational 2 7 years
• Concrete operational 7 11 years
• Formal operations 11 years to adulthood
  (Slavin, 2003)

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Issues of Piagets Stages of Development

• reflexes inborn, automatic responses to
  stimuli.
• object permanence the fact that an object
  exists even if it is out of sight.
• Conservation the concept that certain
  properties of an object remain the same
  regardless of changes in other properties
  (Slavin, 2003)

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Vgotskys View of Cognitive Development

• It is based on two key ideas
• Intellectual development can only be understood
  in terms of a childs historical and cultural
  context.
• Development depends on the sign systems that
  individuals have available to them e.g., the
  cultures language, writing system, or counting
  system (Slavin, 2003).

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Vygotskys Basic Assumptions

• Adults convey to children through conversation
  how their culture interpret and responds to the
  world.
• Every culture transmits physical and cognitive
  tools for daily living.
• Thought and language become increasing
  interdependent in the first years of life
  (Ormrod, 2008).

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Vygotskys Basic Assumptions (continued)

• Complex mental processes begin as social
  activities, children transform the processes that
  they use in social activities into their own
  internal mental activities (Internalization).
• A child can perform more challenging activities
  when they have assistance from a more competent
  person (Ormrod, 2008).

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Similarities and Differences to Piaget

• In contrast to Piaget Vgotsky believed that
  cognitive development is strongly linked to the
  input that children receive from others.
• Similar to Piaget, Vgotsky that the development
  of the sign system was invariant for all children
  (Slavin, 2003)

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How Development Works

• Vgotskys theory suggests that learning precedes
  development learning involves the acquisition
  of signs by means of instruction and information
  from others. Development involves the childs
  internalizing these signs so as to be able to
  think and solve problems without the help of
  others. self-regulation (Slavin, 2003, p. 44)

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Private Speech

• Turns shared knowledge into personal knowledge
• You can observe children talking to themselves
• Later that private speech become silent and can
  be very useful in learning complex tasks (Slavin,
  2003)

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Zone of Proximal Development

• This is where learning occurs
• Tasks that children cannot accomplish by
  themselves, but could do with the help of adults
  or peers (Slavin, 2003)

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Scaffolding

• Typically, scaffolding means providing a child
  with a great deal of support during the early
  stages of learning and then diminishing support
  and having the child take on increasing
  responsibility ( Slavin, 2003, pp. 45-46)

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Implications of Vygotsky

• Cooperative Learning among groups of students
  with differing levels of ability
• Emphasis on students taking more and more
  responsibility for their own learning

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References

• Ormrod, J. E. (2008). Educational Psychology
  Developing Learners, 6th. Upper Saddle, NJ
• Pearson. Merrill, Prentice-Hall.
• Slavin, R. (2003). Educational Psychology Theory
  and Practice and Practice, 7th.
• Boston, MA Allyn and Bacon.