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[Phys-L] Re: Piaget




I don't think it is ad hominem, since I don't know the person well
enough to attack him...it is more like profiling, as in racial
profiling. Let me spin it a different way. There are folks out
there from places I know and respect that say that as children grow,
the ways in which they analyze changes, and that given the right
curricular framework, you can enhance the development of children.
So when some person, with a degree in biology, from school in the
California system...that has lots of well know and prestigious
institutions...that is clearly less prestigious, says that Piaget is
wrong because he got the ages when change occurs wrong, and further
that we should use our authority in the classroom to tell students
what they should know....I'm sorry I just don't find it very credible.
Who cares if the ages are not what Piaget claimed...that is not the
issue, and to make that claim is miss the point.


The age claim is often made to discredit Piaget. His research was made with
a very advanced group of children, including his own, and the ages that he
observed certain types of thinking are much lower than the average for most
populations. He also specifically said that the age at which certain levels
are achieved varies from culture to culture. He was well aware that
development could be different by 4 years from one country to another.

The big mistake often made by people who try to implement Piaget is that
they assume that one should avoid higher level thinking tasks because
students are not capable of them. In reality what one needs to do is to
confront students with tasks that require reasoning at the next higher
level, but avoid tasks which are too high. This of course is very tricky
when one has a classroom with students at a wide range of levels. In
addition one must realize that it takes time to develop reasoning at the
next level.

One thing is clear when one considers level classification is that certain
tasks are impossible to understand if the level of the student is too low.
For example 3 variable equations such as F=ma are really impossible for
concrete operational thinkers to understand. So teaching should involve
both raising the level of thinking, and some curriculum material.

Again, please note that the levels can be used as an indicator of the
development of thinking, without making any other claims. It is a useful
classification.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX
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