Theories about Child Development and Learning by Piaget, Vygotski, Gardner, Dewey, Montessori and Erikson

How Do Children Learn? Theories about Child Development
and Learning

The earliest theories were proposed by philosophers.
Plato: 380-350 B.C.
- children are born with knowledge that simply awaits activation.

J ohn Locke: 1632-1704
- viewed the infant as a blank slate, a tabula rasa.
- the environment (people and experiences) could direct a child’s mind any way
- the main goal of education is self-control
- children learn best when they enjoy the instruction
- adults should use rewards of praise and flattery rather than punishment to mold a child’s learning.

J e an J acques Rousseau: 1712-1778
- first philosopher to write about the first five years of life as distinctly different from the rest of
   childhood
- development occurs according to an inner biological timetable, in a series of stages
- children should not be forced to learn things they may not be ready for-- they learn through their
   own curiosity and as adults, we should let learning unfold naturally
- wrote books about a hypothetical child, Emile, where he allowed nature to raise the child so that
   the child would remain unencumbered by civilized society. The only way Rousseau would interfere
   would be to present lessons, only those that were suited to the child’s age and he would give only
   minimal guidance and never correct Emile’s mistakes.

During the 1800’s early educators began to study the development of young children by actually
observing and interacting with them.
Friedrich Froebel: 1782-1852
- saw young children as individuals who deserve a certain degree of freedom but also need to
   participate in and give back to society
- first to design an organized curriculum that included times of play and freedom combined with
   times of structure and obedience along with circle time for discussion and singing songs
- opened experimental preschools in Germany that he called “kindergartens” (children’s gardens)
   illustrating his idea that the child will grow well if tended and cared for
- is best known for his emphasis on guided play as a method for learning.

Twentieth Century Educators
J ohn Dewey: 1859-1952
- ideas much like Froebel’s in that he thought that early education should be child-centered, based
   on the children’s interests and that they learn best through play and real life experiences
- school life should grow out of home life, teachers should know their children well, observe them
   and then plan, organize and document a purposeful curriculum
- experiences in school could be educational only if they
a) are based on the children’s interests and grow out of their existing knowledge and experience,
b) support the children’s development,
c) help the children develop new skills,
d) add to the children’s understanding of their world and
e) prepare the children to live more fully.
- problem solving his major tenet—‘learning through doing’—through self-selected play

Rachel and Margaret McMillan: 1859-1917, 1860-1931
- born in New York but as young children returned to mother’s home in Scotland where mother
insured a ‘proper education’ for them
- as young women moved to London where they became Christian Socialists, very politically active
and became interested in the schooling and health of slum children
- they worked for medical inspections of schools, campaigned for school meals and healthier
environments by providing bathrooms and improving ventilation in schools
- in 1914 opened and ran inspirational nursery school/training center in Britain where Rachel cared
for their health and Margaret focused on their education
- Margaret wrote books on health and education, she criticized the tendency of schools in working
class areas to concentrate on preparing children for unskilled and monotonous jobs—instead
arguing that schools should be offering a broad and humane education
- influenced by Froebel she believed in the importance of spontaneous play
- their nursery school still in existence today

Maria Montessori: 1870-1952
- at the age of 26, was the first woman in Italy to graduate from medical school
- first professional interest was in mentally retarded children where she founded her ideas that
children need early, orderly, systematic training in mastering one skill after another
- “self-correcting teaching” materials that supported an orderly progression of skill development
towards a specific learning objective
- theory of development that centered on sensitive periods: children go through genetically
preprogrammed blocks of time where they are most eager and able to master certain skills. In the
preschool years, these periods include periods of sensitivity to order, details, use of hands, walking,
and language
- the role of the parent and teacher is to be aware of these sensitive periods and design the
environment to give the child the full opportunity to concentrate on those things the child is
interested in—children learn from the environment around them
- her schools used child sized furnishings with material and equipment accessible to the children,
were organized in mixed age groupings, included many activities of daily living and work with nature
using real tools that work, created beauty and order with many sensory experiences for children to
learn from, gave the children responsibility for keeping the space clean and orderly, provided large
blocks of time for free choice and allowed children to structure their own time
- she taught writing before reading because she found the concrete nature of writing more suited
to the preschooler’s style of learning
- she believed teachers need to take time for careful observation and reflection and use these
observations to guide the environment and curriculum
- she discounted play, fantasy, free drawing (ideas for which she has been criticized)
- she is known as one of history’s great educators who demonstrated how it is possible to follow
children’s own interests and provide materials that will permit them to learn independently and to
develop a love of learning that includes attitudes of confidence, concentration and independence.
Twentieth Century Theorists

Erik Erikson: 1902-1994
- studied child psychoanalysis under Anna Freud in Vienna
- came to US in 1933, taught at Harvard medical School and Yale University, studied influence of
culture and society on child development—wrote first book at age 48
- theory called Eight Stages of Man where each stage (birth to old age) has a particular issue to be
resolved or accomplished before moving satisfactorily to the next stage
- early experiences affect later development but at any time can return and resolve issues
- infants=trust/mistrust
- toddlers=autonomy/shame and doubt
- preschoolers=initiative/guilt
- school age=industry/inferiority
- adolescence-identity/identity confusion
- young adult= intimacy/isolation
- middle age=generativity/stagnation
- old age= ego integration/despair

J e an Piaget: 1896-1980
- a Swiss epistemologist who focused especially on cognitive development, studying how children
arrive at what they know
- believed children construct their own knowledge by giving meaning to the people, places, and
things in their world
- children need every opportunity to do things for themselves
- stages of development all children go through:
- Sensorimotor: B-18mo. Learn through senses and movements
Object permanence, separation and stranger anxiety
Need interesting things to do, cause & effect toys
- Preoperational: 18mo.-6yrs overgeneralize based on limited experience
egocentric—can only focus on one variable at a time
learn through hands on experiences through
assimilation and accommodation
need large blocks of uninterrupted free play
need real world experiences
need open ended activities and open-ended questions
- Concrete operations: 6-12 yrs can reason logically, conserve, reverse her
thinking and hold many variables in mind
- Formal operations: 12 + yrs can think conceptually
can think hypothetically
- he considered social interaction instrumental in developing the thought processes
- criticized for too much focus on inner motivation and thinking and not enough on social
relationships, also for using his own children as subjects and the mathematical/scientific nature
of his tools

Lev Vygotsky: 1896-1934
- Russian teacher who studied Freud, Piaget and Montessori
- died young of TB before he had the opportunity to test his theories
- can’t separate social learning from cognitive learning; they work together & build on each other
- language and development similarly build on each other
- much learning takes place in play
- learn cultural norms from each other and from parents
- studied how speech, memory aids, writing and scientific concepts transform the child’s mind
- the zone of proximal development: the distance between the most difficult task a child can do
alone and the most difficult task a child can do with help—this will tell the teacher what the child is
ready to learn.
- The child on the edge of learning a new concept can benefit from the interaction with a teacher
or another child; this help is now referred to as scaffolding
- teachers need to observe carefully and plan activities to challenge the children’s next level
- talking is important to clarify ideas and learn more about communication so teacher’s need to
encourage conversations and provide opportunities for children to work together
- talking to oneself also important to thinking
- higher levels of thinking—purely abstract or theoretical reasoning—require instruction in writing,
math and other kinds of abstract concepts
- criticized for ignoring inner motivations and focusing too much on cultural forces

Howard Gardner: 1943-
- psychologist and educator, educated at Harvard University
- reseach revolved around a desire to get away from the standard IQ test for assessing children’s
potential
- maintains that people have not just one but at least seven or eight separate kinds of intelligence:
-linguistic -bodily/kinesthetic
-logical/mathematical -interpersonal (social understanding)
-musical -intrapersonal (self understanding)
-spatial -naturalistic
- every normal person has all of these—but may be high in some, weak in others
- these intelligences develop at different rates: log./math. earlier
- one type is not necessarily considered superior to any other type
- standard IQ tests measure only linguistic and logical/mathematical and most schools emphasize
these

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