Vygotsky Vs Piaget Essay

In current educational psychology, both the works of Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky have become prominent in an understanding of developmental cognition in childhood (Duchesne, McMaugh, Bochner & Karuse, 2013, p. 56). Their theories are complimentary and provide a more rigorous comprehension of childhood development (Shayer, M., 2003, p. 465). Their varying principles are applicable to many situations concerning the development of children. The focuses of Piaget and Vygotsky on the ways of childhood development differ. Piaget was focused on the four developmental stages of cognitive growth in his Theory of Cognitive Development, whilst Vygotsky’s principles were based on development in a societal manner with his

Piaget claimed that children were in charge of the construction or the building of their own knowledge and that construction was superior to instruction (Gordon and Browne, 2004). Piaget thought that educators should provide a stimulating environment and have the children explore. Teachers should watch and also interact with the children, but they should let the children find and experience new ideas and knowledge on their own. (Crain, 2005)One of Piaget's major contributions is what is known as the general periods of development. He found four major general periods or stages of child development (Crain, 2005, p. 115): Sensorimotor Intelligence (birth to two years). Babies organize their physical action schemes, such as sucking, grasping, and hitting. Preoperational Thought (two to seven years). Children learn to think but their thinking is illogical and different from that of adults. Concrete Operations (seven to eleven years). Children develop the capacity to think systematically, but only when they can refer to concrete objects and activities. Formal Operations (eleven to adulthood). Young people

Vygotsky may have overplayed importance on social influences because he suggests that child’s cognitive development occurs through social interactions, for example children do internalisation of problem solving via mutual interactions. However, if social learning is the essence of cognitive development then learning would be a lot faster than it is. Thus Vygotsky ignores the biological aspects that aid or restricts the cognitive development such as the development of brain and maturation. Therefore Piaget’s theory of cognitive development is different to

Lev Vygotsky believed that social and cognitive development work simultaneously to build and evolve on one another. He believed that social, cultural and personal experience cannot be detached from each other and many things influence the way children learn and develop, not just their own experiences, thus Vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory. Vygotsky’s ideas were and remain controversial as he had no specific training in psychology or children’s development. His preeminent contribution to children’s development is his recognition of the value of progressing knowledge by means of interaction with educators, peers and family (Mooney, 2000, p. 83). The major ideas of Vygotsky’s theory are scaffolding and the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). Scaffolding is a process Vygotsky described as the framework or temporary support for children’s learning. In order for scaffolding to be beneficial, it must be responsive to the child’s needs (Coon & Mitterer, 2013, pp. 106-107).

At the centre of Piaget's theory is the principle that cognitive development occurs in a series of four distinct, universal stages, each characterized by increasingly sophisticated and

The debate about who has the most accurate theory ,Jean Piaget or Lev Vygotsky. has been ongoing for many years. Both theorist have very supportive and reasonable theories concerning child development, but the differentiate along the lines of how how children process information through attention ,memory, and strategies.( Santrock 2011,p.50) Jean Piaget theory states that children development depends on their experiences and thoughts (schemas) as they grow up . While Vygotsky believed that development of child depends on experiences and assistants with others in the world.

Piaget and Vygotsky both believed that young children actively learn from their hands-on, day-to-day experiences. Jean Piaget portrayed children as "little scientists" who go about actively constructing their understanding of the world. His theories hold the essence of developmentally appropriate curriculum since Piaget believed that children undergo cognitive development in a stage-based manner, such that a very young child would not think about things the same way that an adult might. He referred to the knowledge and the manner in which the knowledge is gained as a schema. In order to build on the cognitive stages that children experience, informal learning opportunities, formal instructional sessions, and the utilized curriculum must all dovetail with a child's current cognitive stage so that assimilation of the new knowledge may occur. Working with what the child knows and experiences, parents and teachers create bridges to the next cognitive stage that are characterized by the child's accommodation. Piaget argued that optimal learning took place in this manner and that adults should avoid thinking that they can accelerate a child's development through the age-based, maturity-referenced stages. This is because a child works toward establishing an equilibrium between the assimilation and application of new knowledge and changing their behavior to accommodate their newly adopted schemas.

The essay is going to introduce short overviews of Piaget (1926) and Vygotsky’s (1978) theories to indicate their different approaches when considering cognitive development. Piaget (1926) developed a constructivist theory which is the basis for the other cognitive development theories that followed. He proposed the definition of schema which refers to children’s construction of shaping their thought and actions through the set of cognitive processes as assimilation, disequilibriums and accommodation. When encountering new experiences, children try to interpret them in terms of known cognitive schemas. In case of failing, they need to adjust their interpretation to the reality (Schaffter & Kipp,8th ed). Based on his assumptions, Piaget (1926) proposed that child as a lone individual progress through four main stages of cognitive development. On the other hand, Vygotsky (1978) presented sociocultural theory. Vygotsky (1978) concentrated on the social interaction between child and adult considering

Jean Piaget is one of the pioneers to child development, he was an important factor in the growth, development and one of the most exciting research theorists in child development. A major force in child psychology, he studied both thought processes and how they change with age. He believed that children think in fundamentally different ways from adults.. Piaget’s belief is that all species inherit the basic tendency to organize their lives and adapt to the world that’s around them, no matter the age. Children develop schemas as a general way of thinking or interacting with ideas and objects in the environment. Children create and develop new schemas as they grow and experience new things. Piaget has identified four major stages of cognitive development which are: sensorimotor stage, preoperational stage, concrete operations, and formal operations. According to the text here are brief descriptions of each of Piaget’s stages:

Jean Piaget was a cognitive theorist and “psychologist who identified stages of mental development, and established the fields of cognitive theory and developmental psychology” (biography.com, n.d.) who was born on August 9th, 1896 in Neuchatel, Switzerland. Jean Piaget’s three children influenced his work as he used them in his case studies of child development. He graduated from the University of Neuchatel graduated in 1916 when he was twenty years old, then went on to get his doctorate of Biology at the age of 22. Piaget’s cognitive theory is made up of 3 components; schemas; adaptation processes and the four stages of development. The first component to his cognitive theory is the four stages of child development, the sensorimotor stage (birth – 2 years) which involves learning through motor actions, the preoperational stage (2 years – 7 years) which involves children developing intelligence by

For this paper I will be exploring Piaget's theory of cognitive development. Swiss Psychologist Jean Piaget, theorized that children progress through four key stages of cognitive development that change their understanding of the world. By observing his own children, Piaget came up with four different stages of intellectual development that included: the sensorimotor stage, which starts from birth to age two; the preoperational stage, starts from age two to about age seven; the concrete operational stage, starts from age seven to eleven; and final stage, the formal operational stage, which begins in adolescence and continues into adulthood. In this paper I will only be focusing on the

In order to support children’s growth educators try to provide a stimulating classroom environment. They implement different strategies, tools and practices to help achieve this goal. Since educators play an important role in children’s development they should be familiar with developmental psychology and know of its educational implications in the classroom. There are two major approaches of developmental psychology: (1) Cognitive development as it relates to Piaget and (2) social development as it relates to Vygotsky. An educator may find it useful to study Piaget’s theory of cognitive development to help children build on their own knowledge.

Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of development suggested that to develop cognitively, children must have social interaction. He also “believed that this lifelong process of development was dependent of social interaction and that social learning actually leads to cognitive development” (Riddle, 1999). Vygotsky believed that children 's social learning must come before social development. Vygotsky also believed that "human activities take place in cultural settings and cannot be understood apart from these settings" (Woolfolk, 2004). Therefore, our culture helps shape our cognition.

Lev Semionovich Vygotsky was a Russian psychologist and constructivist learning theorist who was known for arguing against the theories of psychologist Jean Piaget. Piaget believed that in order for any learning to occur there had to development within the individual first, but Vygotsky argued the contrary. He argued that in order for development to occur, the individual would first have to have learning take place through instruction and example in a given appropriate environment. Vygotsky’s theory on cognitive development is centralized on two key ideas known as scaffolding and the zone of proximal development which will be explored in this essay and how they contribute to the classroom.

Jean Piaget, a cognitivist, believed children progressed through a series of four key stages of cognitive development. These four major stages, sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational, are marked by shifts in how people understand the world. Although the stages correspond with an approximate age, Piaget’s stages are flexible in that if the child is ready they can reach a stage. Jean Piaget developed the Piagetian cognitive development theory. Piaget’s theory of cognitive development proposes that a child’s intellect, or cognitive ability, progresses through four distinct stages. The emergence of new abilities and ways of processing information characterize each stage. Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development suggests that children move through four different stages of mental development. His theory focuses not only on understanding how children acquire knowledge, but also on understanding the nature of intelligence.