Cognitive Development/Language
Piaget, Vygotsky
Terms
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- development
- orderly, adaptive changes we go through from conception to death
- compensation
- the principle that changes in one dimension can be offset by changes in another
- concrete operations
- mental tasks tied to concrete objects and situations
- decentering
- focusing on more than one aspect at a time
- sensorimotor
- involving the senses and motor activity
- syntax
- the order of words in phrases or sentences
- classification
- grouping objects into categories
- equilibration
- search for mental balance between cognitive schemes and information from the environment
- physical development
- changes in body structure and function over time
- adolescent egocentrism
- assumption that everyone else shares one's thoughts, feelings, and concerns
- organization
- ongoing process of arranging information and experience into mental systems or categories
- lateralization
- the specialization of the two hemispheres of the cerebral cortex
- adaptation
- adjustment to the environment
- maturation
- genetically programmed, naturally occurring changes over time
- preoperational
- the stages before a child masters logical mental operations
- Neo-Piagetian theories
- More recent theories that integrate findings about attention, memory, and startegy use with Piaget's insights about children's thinking and the construction of knowledge
- hypotetico-deductive reasoning
- a formal-operations problem-solving strategy in which an individual begins by identifying all the factors that might affect a problem and then deduces and systematically evlauates specific solutions
- pragmatics
- the rules for when and how to use language to be an effective communicator in a particular culture
- egocentric
- assuming that others experience the world the way you do
- semiotic function
- the ability to use symbols - language, pictures, signs, or gestures - to represent actions or objects mentally
- cultural tools
- the real tools (computers, scales, etc) and symbol systems (numbers, language, graphs) that allow people in a society to communicate, think, solve problems, and create knowledge
- object permanence
- the understanding that objects have a separate, permanent existence
- collective monologue
- form of speech in which children in a group talk but do not really interact or communicate
- cognitive development
- gradual orderly changes by which mental processes become more complex and sophisticated
- seriation
- arranging objects in sequential order according to one aspect, such as size, weight, or volume
- formal operations
- mental tasks involving abstract thinking and coordination of a number of variables
- private speech
- children's self-talk which guides their thinking and action. Eventually these verbalizations are internalized as silent inner speech.
- metalinguistic awareness
- understanding about aone's own use of language
- disequilibrium
- in Piaget's theory, the "out-of-balance" state that occurs when a person realizes that his or her current ways of thinking are not working to solve a problem or understand a situation
- reversible thinking
- thinking backward, from the end to the beginning
- personal development
- changes in personality that take place as one grows
- goal-directed actions
- deliberate actions toward a goal
- myelination
- the process by which neural fibers are coated with a fatty sheath called myelin that makes message transfer more efficient
- schemes
- mental systems or categories of perception and experience
- Sociocultural theory
- Emphasizes role in development of cooperative dialogues between children and more knowledgeable memners of society. Children learn the culture of their community (way of thinking and behaving) through these interactions
- scaffolding
- support for learning and problem solving, such as clues, reminders, encouragement, breaking the problem down, providing an example, anything to help the student grow as an independent learner
- conservation
- prinicple that some characteristics of an object remain the same despite changes in appearance
- assisted learning
- providing strategic help in the inital stages of learning, gradually diminishing as students gain independence
- synapses
- the tiny space between neurons - chemical messages are sent across these gaps
- accommodation
- altering existing schemes or creating new ones in response to new information
- identity
- principle that a person or object remains the same over time
- zone of proximal development
- phase at which a child can master a task if given appropriate help and support
- assimilation
- fitting new information into existing schemes
- social development
- changes over time in the ways we relate to others
- Co-constructed process
- A social process in which people interact and negotiate (usually verbally) to create an underatnding or to solve a problem. The final product is shaped by all participants.
- operations
- actions a person carries out by thinking them through instead of literally performing the actions
- reversibility
- a characteristic of Piagetian logical operations - the ability to think through a series of steps, then mentally reverse the steps and return to the starting point