Question

1.Create a fictitious child with a name, an age during early childhood, and a gender.

2.Describe one component of the fictional child’s physical development.

3.Explain one component of the fictitious child’s cognitive development using Piaget’s theory of cognitive development.

4.Explain one component of the fictitious child’s cognitive development using the information-processing approach to cognitive development.

5.Describe one environmental factor that affects the fictitious child’s physical development or cognitive development.

Answer 1

Note: This response is in UK English, please paste the response to MS Word and you should be able to spot discrepancies easily. You may elaborate the answer based on personal views or your classwork if necessary.

(Answer)

• Jean Piaget’s Stages of Development: Piaget’s stages of cognitive development –

Sensorimotor (0-2 years) Infant develops learning based on what is absorbed through the senses.

Preoperational (2-6 years) Child uses images to understand objects but does not understand them logically.

Concrete operational (7-12) Child can think logically about concrete objects. They can add, subtract and observe.

Formal operational (12 and up) The child understands abstract terms and is able to hypothesize.

• The information-processing theory is based on the idea that humans actually process the information they receive than just responding to stimuli. This response is generally based on the level of understanding and maturity of a person.
• John Doe is 5 years old and his parents have just adopted a dog from the pound. This dog is already unwell and has only a few months to live. John, however, completely falls in love with the dog and grows much attached to the dog. When the dog dies, John’s parents try to make him understand that the dog is gone to a different and better place.

This makes John very angry because he feels that the dog preferred another family with a better house and has, therefore, left John and his family. This is because the information-processing theory and the preoperational theory coincide. The information is being processed but John lacks the mature understanding to know what is actually going on. While he might have an ostensible understanding, he isn’t able to know the situation logically and he does not have an abstract understanding of it all.

When John grows up, he begins to realise that his dog did not really “leave” to go to a better house but is actually in a “better place.”