CentrationEgocentrismFocus on appearanceStatic reasoningIrreversibilityMake – Believe PlayMake-believe play is more complex and often involves children to be in dramatic scenes that they have observed in their society. Imagination begins to flourish and make believe is not only more complex, but also detaches from life condition (a child may use an object that does not even look like a phone as a toy phone). Make-believe play is also less self-centered as children add in toys (baby dolls) to their imaginative scenes.Make believe play offers children many benefits, the most fundamental being social and cognitive development.CentrationCentration is the tendency of children to focus on only one aspect of a whole situation.Ex: a child who sees a tall 4 year – old and a short 5 year – old, may insist that the 4 year – old is older only because he or she is taller.EgocentrismEgocentrism is the inability to consider another person’s point of view (derived from Centration). Egocentrism does NOT mean selfishness.Ex: Piaget’s three mountain problem – a sculpture of three mountains is placed between a child and a doll. The child is asked to draw the mountains from the doll’s point of view. Most children will draw the mountains from their own point of view.Focus on AppearanceYoung children will tend to focus on only what is apparent to them and will ignore other relevant attributes.Ex: A child who believes that a girl with a short haircut “must” be a boy, regardless of the girl’s more feminine attributes.Static ReasoningYoung children use static reasoning and assume the world is unchanging. They believe that the world will stay however they always see it.Ex: A boy is surprised to learn that his teacher is also someone’s mother, or that his teacher does not live at school, but has a normal life just like his own family.IrreversibilityIrreversibility is the inability to mentally reverse a series of steps. This means that young children fail to recognize that reversing a process can sometimes return it to its original state before the process had started.Ex: A child refuses to eat a hamburger that is “contaminated” by lettuce even after the lettuce is taken away from the hamburger. They fail to see the removal of the lettuce as a restoring of the hamburger, and believe it is still “contaminated.”The Lack of Conservation and LogicThe lack of conservation means that children fail to see that the physical traits of an object remain even though its appearance has been altered.Ex: One cup of milk is poured into a tall thin glass, and one cup of milk is poured into a short wide glass. Even though both glasses have the same amount of milk, the child will prefer the taller glass, because they believe “taller means more” and have not yet begun to think logically. Children will not begin to think logically until the age of 7.Preoperational Thought UpdatedPiaget’s theory on preoperational thought has been vastly updated to include other aspects of thought:Evaluation of Vygotsky’s TheoryLanguageEarly childhood seems to be a sensitive period for learning language. This is the time when language learning happens most easily.Lecture 9Outline of Last Lecture I. Body Growth and DevelopmentII. The “Just So” Phenomenon in ChildrenIII. Motor SkillsIV. Artistic DevelopmentOutline of Current Lecture V. Piaget’s Theory of Preoperational ThinkingA. Importance of Make – believe playVI. Vygotsky’s Sociocultural TheoryVII. Theory of MindVIII. LanguageCurrent LectureCognitive development in young children begins with Preoperational Thinking. During this stage, children makelarge gains in forming mental representation. These gains include:- Engaging in Make-Believe Play- Developing languageHowever, while these are quite important and monumental strides, children are not yet very logical. The illogical thinking presents some limitations:- Centrationo Egocentrism- Focus on appearance- Static reasoning- Irreversibility Make – Believe Play PSYCH 250 1st EditionMake-believe play is more complex and often involves children to be in dramatic scenes that they have observed in their society. Imagination begins to flourish and make believe is not only more complex, but also detaches from life condition (a child may use an object that does not even look like a phone as a toy phone). Make-believe play is also less self-centered as children add in toys (baby dolls) to their imaginative scenes.Make believe play offers children many benefits, the most fundamental being social and cognitive development.CentrationCentration is the tendency of children to focus on only one aspect of a whole situation.Ex: a child who sees a tall 4 year – old and a short 5 year – old, may insist that the 4 year – old is older only because he or she is taller.EgocentrismEgocentrism is the inability to consider another person’s point of view (derived from Centration). Egocentrism does NOT mean selfishness.Ex: Piaget’s three mountain problem – a sculpture of three mountains is placed between a child and a doll. The child is asked to draw the mountains from the doll’s point of view. Most children will draw the mountains from their own point of view.Focus on AppearanceYoung children will tend to focus on only what is apparent to them and will ignore other relevant attributes.Ex: A child who believes that a girl with a short haircut “must” be a boy, regardless of the girl’s more feminine attributes.Static ReasoningYoung children use static reasoning and assume the world is unchanging. They believe that the world will stay however they always see it.Ex: A boy is surprised to learn that his teacher is also someone’s mother, or that his teacher does not live at school, but has a normal life just like his own family.IrreversibilityIrreversibility is the inability to mentally reverse a series of steps. This means that young children fail to recognize that reversing a process can sometimes return it to its original state before the process had started.Ex: A child refuses to eat a hamburger that is “contaminated” by lettuce even after the lettuce is taken away from the hamburger. They fail to see the removal of the lettuce as a restoringof the hamburger, and believe it is still “contaminated.”The Lack of Conservation and LogicThe lack of conservation means that children fail to see that the physical traits of an object remain even though its appearance has