Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood Chapter 12 PowerPoint presentation produced by: Dr. Karen Hoblit – Associate Professor of Psychology, Victoria

Cognitive Development inMiddle Childhood

Chapter 12

PowerPoint presentation produced by:Dr. Karen Hoblit – Associate Professor of Psychology, Victoria College

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Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2002


I. PIAGET’S THEORY: THE CONCRETE OPERATIONAL STAGE

The concrete operational stage spans the years from 7 to 11; during this period thought is more logical, flexible, and organized than it was during early childhood.


Conservation

The ability to pass conservation tasks provides clear evidence of operations—mental actions that obey logical rules.

Decentration is the ability to focus on several aspects of a problem at once and relate to them.

Reversibility is the ability to mentally go through a series of steps in a problem and then reverse the direction, returning to the starting point.


Classification

By the end of middle childhood, children pass Piaget’s class inclusion problem.

They can now group objects into hierarchies of classes and subclasses.

Collections become common in middle childhood.


Seriation

Seriation is the ability to order items along a quantitative dimension, such as length or weight.

Transitive inference is the ability to perform seriation mentally.


Spatial Reasoning

Piaget found that school-age children have a more accurate understanding of space than they did earlier.

Distance

Middle childhood brings improved understanding of distance. By the early school years, children understand that a filled-up space has the

same value as an empty space.

Directions

Between 7 and 8 years, children start to perform mental rotations, in which they align the self’s frame to match that of a person in a different orientation. As a result, they can identify left and right for positions they do not occupy.

Around 8 to 10 years, children can give clear, well-organized directions for how to get from one place to another by using a “mental walk” strategy in which they imagine another person’s movement along a route.


Limitations of Concrete Operational Thought

Children think in an organized, logical fashion only when dealing with concrete information that they can perceive directly.

Their mental operations work poorly when applied to abstract ideas.

Horizontal décalage is gradual development that occurs within a Piagetian stage. For example, children usually grasp conservation problems in a certain order: first number; then length, liquid, mass; and finally weight.


Recent Research on Concrete Operational Thought

The Impact of Culture and Schooling

According to Piaget, brain development combined with exposure to a rich and varied world should lead children in every culture to reach the concrete operational stage.

Research indicates that conservation is often delayed in non-Western societies.

For children to master conservation and other Piagetian concepts, they must take part in everyday activities that promote this way of thinking.

Some researchers believe that the forms of logic required by Piagetian tasks are socially generated by practical activities in particular cultures.


Recent Research on Concrete Operational Thought cont.

An Information-Processing View of the Horizontal Décalage

Some neo-Piagetian theorists argue that the development of operational thinking can best be understood in terms of gains in information-processing capacity rather than a sudden shift to a new stage.

When cognitive schemes are repeatedly used, they demand less attention and become more automatic. This results in more working memory space, and children can then focus on combining old schemes and generating new ones.

Once enough working memory is available to integrate schemes, children acquire central conceptual structures—networks of concepts and relations that permit them to think about a wide range of situations in more advanced ways.

Children show horizontal décalage because first, different forms of the same logical insight vary in the processing demands they make on a child. Second, children’s task-specific experiences vary widely.

Research has shown that children not at the expected level of scheme integration for their age can usually be trained to reach it.


Evaluation of the Concrete Operational Stage

Debate about this stage centers on whether development is a continuous improvement in logical skills or a discontinuous restructuring of children’s thinking.

From early to middle childhood, children apply logical schemes to a much wider range of tasks. In the process, their thought seems to undergo qualitative change toward a more comprehensive grasp of the underlying principles of logical thought.

Some blend of Piagetian and information processing ideas holds greatest promise for understanding cognitive development in middle childhood.


Evaluation of the Concrete Operational Stage

Play grocery store used to investigate children’s planning


II. INFORMATION PROCESSING

Brain development contributes to two basic changes in information processing.

Increase in information-processing capacity. A fairly rapid decline in time needed to process information occurs during middle childhood, with this decline trailing off around age 12.

Gains in cognitive inhibition. Cognitive inhibition—the ability to resist interference from irrelevant information makes great strides

during middle childhood.


Attention

During middle childhood, attention becomes more controlled, adaptable, and planful.

Selectivity and Adaptability

Through the elementary years, children become better at deliberately attending to just those aspects of a situation that are relevant to task goals.

Older children can flexibly adjust their attention to the momentary requirements of situations.

Attention strategy development follows a predictable, four-step sequence:

Production deficiency—preschoolers fail to produce strategies when they could be helpful.

Control deficiency—young elementary school children fail to control, or execute, strategies effectively.

Utilization deficiency—slightly older children apply strategiesconsistently, but their performance does not improve.

Effective strategy use—by mid-elementary school years, children use strategies consistently, and performance improves.


Attention cont.

Planning

School-age children scan detailed pictures and written materials for similarities and differences more thoroughly than do preschoolers.

On complex tasks, school-age children make decisions about what to do first and next in an orderly fashion.

The development of planning illustrates how attention becomes coordinated with other cognitive processes.

Children learn much about how to plan effectively by collaborating on tasks with more expert planners.

Attentional difficulties are at the heart of the problems of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), a disorder in which children have great difficulty staying on task, act impulsively, and may be hyperactive.


Memory Strategies

Memory strategies are the deliberate mental activities we use to store and retain information.

Rehearsal and Organization

Rehearsal involves repeating information to oneself over and over again.

Organization is grouping together related items.

Memory strategies require time and effort to perfect. At first, control deficiencies are evident.

Although younger school-age children’s use of multiple strategies has little impact on performance—a utilization deficiency—their tendency to experiment is adaptive.

Older children organize more skillfully and use organization in a wider range of memory tasks.


Memory Strategies cont.

Elaboration

Elaboration is the strategy of creating a relationship, or shared meaning, between two or more items that are not members of the same category. Children start to use this strategy by the end of middle childhood.

Organization and elaboration combine items into meaningful chunks and permit children to retain more information.

When children store a new item in long-term memory by linking it to information they already know, they can retrieve it easily by thinking of other items associated with it.


The Knowledge Base and Memory Performance

During middle childhood, children arrange the vast amount of information in their memories into increasingly elaborate, hierarchically structured networks.

Knowing more about a particular topic makes new information more meaningful and familiar so it is easier to store and retrieve.

Children who are expert in a particular area acquire knowledge more quickly and actively use what they know to add more.

By the end of the school years, knowledge acquisition and use of memory strategies are intimately related and support one another.


Culture, Schooling, and Memory Strategies

A repeated finding of cross-cultural research is that people who have no formal schooling do not use or benefit from instruction in memory strategies.

Western children get so much practice using memory strategies that they do not refine other techniques for remembering that rely on spatial location and arrangement of objects.

Development of memory strategies is a product not just of a more competent information-processing system but also of task demands and cultural circumstances.


The School-Age Child’s Theory of Mind

Children’s theory of mind —a set of beliefs about mental activities—becomes more elaborate and refined during middle childhood. This awareness of cognitive processes is called metacognition.

School-age children have an improved ability to reflect on their own mental life, which accounts for some of the advances in thinking and problem solving that take place at this time.


The School-Age Child’s Theory of Mind cont.

Knowledge of Cognitive Capacities

Unlike preschoolers, who view the mind as a passive container, older children regard it as an active, constructive agent capable of selecting and transforming information.

Six- and 7-year-olds know that doing well on a task depends on focusing attention.

They also grasp the interrelatedness of memory and understanding.

Knowledge of Strategies

School-age children are also aware that in studying material for later recall, it is helpful to devote most effort to items that you know least well.

They can take account of interactions among variables—how age and motivation of the learner, effective use of strategies, and nature and difficulty of the task work together to affect cognitive performance.


Cognitive Self-Regulation

Cognitive self-regulation is the process of continuously monitoring progress toward a goal, checking outcomes, and redirecting unsuccessful efforts.

Self-regulation is not well developed until adolescence, when it becomes a strong predictor of academic success.

Parents and teachers can foster self-regulation by pointing out the special demands of tasks, encouraging the use of strategies, and emphasizing the value of self-correction.

Children who acquire effective self-regulatory skills develop confidence in their own abilities.

Learned helpless youngsters receive messages from parents and teachers that seriously undermine their academic self-esteem and self-regulatory skills.


Applications of Information Processing to Academic Learning

Reading

A whole language approach to beginning reading parallels children’s natural language learning and keeps reading materials whole and meaningful.

A basic-skills approach emphasizes training in phonics—the basic rules for translating written symbols into sounds—and simplified reading materials.

Research does not show clear-cut superiority for either of these approaches.

Learning the basics—relations between letters and sounds—enables children to decode, or decipher, words they have never seen before. Research shows that phonological awareness—the ability to segment, blend, and manipulate the sound structure of words—predicts early reading success.

If practice in basic skills is overemphasized, children may lose sight of the goal of reading—understanding.

As decoding and comprehension skills reach a high level of efficiency, older readers can become actively engaged with the text.


Applications of Information Processing to Academic Learning cont.

Mathematics

Over the early elementary school years, children acquire basic math facts through a combination of frequent practice and reasoning about number concepts.

Research indicates that conceptual knowledge serves as a vital base for the development of accurate, efficient computation in middle childhood.

In Asian countries, pupils receive a variety of supports for acquiring mathematical knowledge that are not broadly available in the United States.


III. INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN MENTAL DEVELOPMENT

Around age 6, IQ becomes more stable and it correlates well with academic achievement.


Defining and Measuring Intelligence

Virtually all intelligence tests provide an overall score (the IQ), which is taken to represent general intelligence or reasoning ability, and an array of separate scores measuring specific mental abilities.

Intelligence is a collection of many mental capacities, not all of which are included on currently available tests.

The statistical technique called factor analysis determines which sets of items on an intelligence test correlate strongly with one another.


Defining and Measuring Intelligence cont.

Representative Intelligence Tests

Group administered tests permit large numbers of pupils to be tested at once and require little training of teachers who give them.

Individually administered tests demand considerable training and experience to give well.



The Stanford–Binet Intelligence Scale

The Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale is appropriate for individuals between 2 years of age and adulthood.

The latest version measures both intelligence and four intellectual factors: verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, abstract/visual reasoning, and short-term memory.

The verbal and quantitative factors emphasize culturally loaded, fact-oriented information.

The abstract/visual reasoning factor tests children’s ability to see complex relationships and is believed to be less culturally biased.



The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children–III

The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children–III (WISC–III) is appropriate for 6- through 16-year-olds.

The Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence-Revised (WPPSI-R) is appropriate for children 3 through 8.

Both tests measure two broad intellectual factors: verbal and performance scores. Each contains 6 subtests, yielding 12 separate scores in all.

The Wechsler tests provided one of the first means through which non-English-speaking children and children with speech and language disorders could demonstrate their intellectual strengths.

The Wechsler tests were the first to be standardized on samples representing the total population of the U. S., including ethnic minorities.



Recent Developments in Defining Intelligence

Some researchers conduct componential analyses of children’s IQ scores by looking for relationships between aspects of information processing and intelligence test scores.

One disadvantage of the componential approach is that it regards intelligence as entirely due to causes within the child.



Sternberg’s Triarchic Theory

Made up of three interacting subtheories.

The componential subtheory spells out the information-processing skills that underlie intelligent behavior.

The experiential subtheory states that highly intelligent individuals, in comparison to less intelligent ones, process information more skillfully in novel situations. Brightness is the ability to deal with novelty and learn efficiently.

The contextual subtheory proposes that intelligent people adapt their information-processing skills, shape or change the situation, or select new contexts to fit with their personal desires and the demands of the everyday world.

This theory emphasizes the complexity of intelligent behavior and limitations of current tests in assessing that complexity.



Sternberg’s triarchic theory of intelligence



Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences

Identifies at least eight independent intelligences on the basis of distinct sets of processing operations that permit individuals to engage in a wide range of culturally valued activities.

Gardner argues that each intelligence has a unique biological basis, a distinct course of development, and different expert performances.

Cultural values and learning opportunities have a great deal to do with the extent to which a child’s intellectual strengths are realized.

Gardner’s theory has yet to be firmly grounded in research.

Nevertheless, Gardner’s theory highlights several intelligences not measured by IQ scores, such as emotional intelligence.

Gardner’s theory has been helpful in efforts to understand and nurture children’s special talents.


Explaining Individual and Group Differences in IQ

American black children score, on the average, 15 IQ points below American white children, although this difference is shrinking.

The gap between middle-SES and low-SES children is about 9 points.

There is considerable variation within each ethnic and SES group.


Explaining Individual and Group Differences in IQ cont. Nature versus Nurture

Identical twins have more similar IQ scores than do fraternal twins.

On the basis of twin studies and other kinship information, current researchers estimate that about half the differences among children in IQ can be traced to their genetic makeup.

Adoption research confirms the balanced position that both heredity and environment affect IQ scores.

Research on black children adopted by well-off white homes during the first year of life indicates that poverty severely depresses the intelligence of large numbers of ethnic minority children.

In addition, unique cultural values and practices do not prepare these children for the kinds of tasks that are sampled by intelligence tests and valued in school.


Explaining Individual and Group Differences in IQ cont.

Cultural Influences

Language Customs

Ethnic minority subcultures often foster unique language skills that do not fit the expectations of most classrooms and testing situations.

Anthropologist Shirley Brice Heath observed that black adults asked children very different kinds of questions than is typical in white middle-SES families.

Children of Hispanic immigrants are taught to respect adult authority rather than express their own knowledge and opinions. Yet teachers may equate this silence with having a negative attitude toward learning.

Familiarity with Test Content

Evidence indicates that the amount of time a child spends in school is a strong predictor of IQ.

Teaching children the factual knowledge and ways of thinking valued in classrooms has a sizable impact on their intelligence test performance.


Explaining Individual and Group Differences in IQ cont.

Reducing Cultural Bias in Intelligence Tests

Many experts do acknowledge that IQ scores can underestimate the intelligence of culturally different children.

In a testing approach called dynamic testing, the adult introduces purposeful teaching into the testing situation to see what the child can attain with social support. This approach is consistent with Vygotsky’s concept of the zone of proximal development.

Many minority children perform more competently after adult assistance.

Intelligence tests are useful measures when interpreted carefully by examiners who are sensitive to the impact of culture on test performance.


IV. LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

Vocabulary

By the end of the school years, recognition vocabulary reaches about 40,000 words.

School-age children enlarge their vocabularies through analyzing the structure of complex words.

As their knowledge base becomes better organized school-age children think about and use words more precisely.

School-age children grasp the double meanings of some words, which leads to the understanding of metaphors and the use of riddles and

puns.


Grammar

Use of the passive voice expands during middle childhood.

Another grammatical achievement is the understanding of infinitive phrases.

Appreciation of subtle grammatical distinctions is supported by metalinguistic awareness.


Pragmatics

Improvements in pragmatics, the communicative side of language, take place in middle childhood.

Children become better at adapting to the needs of listeners in challenging communicative situations.

Conversational strategies also become more refined. For example, older children are better at phrasing things to get their way, and they are sensitive to subtle distinctions between what people say and what they really mean.


Learning Two Languages at a Time

An estimated 6 million American school-age children speak a language other than English at home.

Bilingual Development

Children become bilingual by acquiring both languages at the same time in early childhood, or by leaning a second language after mastering the first.

Children who are fluent in two languages do better than their single-language agemates on tests of analytical reasoning, concept formation, and cognitive flexibility, and they are advanced in their ability to reflect on language.


Learning Two Languages at a Time cont.

Bilingual Education

Some educators believe that time spent communicating in the child’s native tongue detracts from English language achievement.

Other educators are committed to truly bilingual education: developing minority children’s native language while fostering mastery of English.

Providing instruction in the native tongue lets minority children know their heritage is respected and prevents semilingualism, or inadequate proficiency in both languages.

At present, public opinion sides with limiting bilingual education.

Yet, when both languages are integrated into the curriculum, minority children are more involved in learning, participate more actively in class discussions, and acquire the second language more easily.


V. CHILDREN’S LEARNING IN SCHOOL

Class Size

Small class sizes are beneficial because teachers spend less time disciplining and more time giving individual attention, and children’s interactions with one another are more positive and cooperative.

Also, when class size is small teachers and pupils are more satisfied with school experiences. Learning advantages of small classes are greatest in the early years.


Educational Philosophies

Traditional versus Open Classrooms

In a traditional classroom, children are passive learners who acquire information presented by the teachers. Pupils are evaluated on the basis of how well they keep up with a uniform set of standards for all pupils in their grade.

In an open classroom, children are active agents in their own development. The teacher shares decision making with pupils, who learn at their own pace. Pupils are evaluated in relation to their own prior development.

The combined results of many studies reveal that older school-age children in traditional classrooms have a slight edge in terms of academic achievements.

However, open-classroom pupils are more critical thinkers, and they value and respect individual differences in their classmates more.

The heavy emphasis on traditional kindergarten and primary classrooms on knowledge absorption has contributed to a growing trend among parents to delay kindergarten for a year.


Educational Philosophies cont.

New Vygotsky-Inspired Directions

Vygotsky’s emphasis on the social origins of higher cognitive processes has inspired the following educational themes:

Teachers and parents as partners in learning. Experience with many types of symbolic communication in meaningful

activities. Teaching adapted to each child’s zone of proximal development.

Reciprocal Teaching

Reciprocal teaching was originally designed to improve reading comprehension in pupils with achievement problems, but has been adapted to other subjects as well.

Within dialogues, group members apply four cognitive strategies: asking questions, summarizing, clarifying, and predicting upcoming content.

Elementary and junior high students exposed to reciprocal teaching show impressive gains in reading comprehension.


Educational Philosophies cont.

The Kamehameha Elementary Education Program (KEEP)

Based upon Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development.

In KEEP classrooms, children work on a project that ensures that their learning will be active and directed toward a meaningful goal.

KEEP students frequently work in small groups and engage in cooperative learning.

Research to date suggests that the KEEP approach is highly effective.


Teacher–Student Interaction

A disappointing finding is that American teachers emphasize rote, repetitive drill more than higher-level thinking.

Well-behaved, high-achieving pupils experience positive interactions with their teachers.

The educational self-fulfilling prophecy is the idea that children may adopt teachers’ positive or negative attitudes toward them and start to live up to these views.


Grouping Practices

Often pupils are assigned to homogenous groups or classes in which children of similar achievement levels are taught together.

Ability grouping of students widens the gap between high and low achievers.

Another approach to grouping is to increase the heterogeneity of pupils. In multigrade classrooms, pupils who would otherwise be assigned to different grades are taught together.

Peer tutoring is an aspect of mixed-age classrooms that makes them particularly cooperative.

For collaboration between heterogeneous peers to succeed, children need extensive training and guidance in cooperative learning.


Computers in the Classroom

Advantages of Computers

Computer-assisted instruction is the use of computers to practice basic skills and transmit new knowledge.

Word processing permits students to create written products that are longer and of higher quality.

Programming leads to improvements in concept formation, problem solving, and creativity. Furthermore, gains in metacognition and self-regulation result from programming experiences.

New communications technology, available through e-mail and the World Wide Web, allow children to access information and interact with people around the world.


Computers in the Classroom cont.

Concerns about Computers

By the end of middle childhood, boys spend much more time with computers than do girls, both in and out of school.

Many parents are concerned that their children will become overly involved as well as more aggressive through playing fast-paced computer games with highly violent content.


Teaching Children with Special Needs

Children with Learning Difficulties

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act mandates that schools place children who require special supports for learning into the “least restrictive” environments that meet their educational needs.

Mainstreaming is the integration of pupils with learning difficulties into regular classrooms for part or all of the school day.

In some schools mainstreaming has been extended to full inclusion—placement in regular classrooms full time.

Children who are mildly mentally retarded have IQs that fall between 55 and 70 and who also show problems in adaptive behavior.

The largest number of mainstreamed children have learning disabilities, which are specific learning disorders that lead children to achieve poorly in school, despite an average or above average IQ.


Teaching Children with Special Needs cont.

Their problems cannot be traced to any obvious physical or emotional difficulty or to environmental disadvantage. Faulty brain functioning is believed to be responsible.

How Effective Are Mainstreaming and Full Inclusion?

The goals of mainstreaming and inclusion are to provide more appropriate academic experiences and to integrate participation in classroom life.

Achievement differences between mainstreamed pupils and those taught in self-contained classrooms are not great.

Children with disabilities in regular classrooms often are rejected by peers.

These children do best when they receive instruction in a resource room for part of the day and in the regular classroom for the remainder of the day.

Once children enter the regular classroom, special steps must be taken to promote peer acceptance.


Teaching Children with Special Needs cont

Gifted Children

Gifted children display exceptional intellectual strengths, including high IQ, keen memory, and an exceptional capacity to solve challenging problems rapidly and accurately.


Teaching Children with Special Needs cont

Gifted Children cont.

Creativity and Talent

High creativity can result in a child being designated as gifted. Divergent thinking is the generation of multiple and unusual

possibilities when faced with a task or problem. Tests of creativity tap divergent thinking.

Convergent thinking is the generation of a single correct answer to a problem. This is the type of cognition emphasized on intelligence tests.

Definitions of giftedness have been extended to include specialized talent.

Parents of talented children emphasize curiosity, provide a home rich in stimulation, recognize their children’s creative potential, and arrange for apprenticeship under inspiring teachers.

Extreme giftedness often results in social isolation. Many talented youths become experts in their fields, yet few become

highly creative.


Teaching Children with Special Needs cont.

Educating the Gifted

The extent to which programs for the gifted foster creativity and talent depends on opportunities to acquire relevant skills.

Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences has inspired several model programs that include all pupils.

Evidence is still needed on how effectively these programs nurture children’s talents.

These programs may be useful in identifying talented, low-SES minority children, who are underrepresented in school programs for the gifted.


How Well Educated Are America’s Children?

American children fare unevenly when their achievement is compared to that of children in other industrialized nations.

A variety of social forces combine to foster a much stronger commitment to learning in Asian families and schools.

Families, schools, and the larger society must work together to upgrade American education.

Achievement of U.S. elementary and secondary students has improved over the past decade in reading, math, and science.

Documents

Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood Chapter 12 PowerPoint presentation produced by: Dr. Karen Hoblit – Associate Professor of Psychology, Victoria