Sensorimotor Stage Child Case Study

1 What are the general characteristics of the sensorimotor stage child? A child in the sensorimotor stage is between the ages of birth and 2 years old. Therefore, at this time the infant is using their senses and motor actions in order to discover and comprehend the world around them. At their youngest age they begin by functioning with innate reflexes, and as they grow to explore the world they progress towards “intelligent” actions. As this stage comes to its end the individual can now use images and/or words within their thoughts. Overall, they now have the ability to evaluate a problem mentally and begin to think of solutions to that problem.
2. On encountering Santa, explain how the sensorimotor stage child would react and behave. …show more content…
As they are easily fooled by appearances, in this case the smile, the pretty alternating colors, and the hat that moves when he does, they will lean towards accepting Santa. They additionally tend to rely on their own perspectives, and would choose to believe that this being has the magic and ability to fly at night, delivering presents to every home. This also ties into their inability to solve conservation problems, such as the conservation of liquid quantity task. Their belief in Santa and his magic is similar to their belief in their being more water transferred into a new cup.
8. How would the preoperational stage child approach or deal with this experience? Children at the preoperational stage tend to disregard perspectives other than their own. In approaching the experience of encountering Santa, they will have been fooled by the idea of who he is and what he stands for. Their acceptance of Santa is due to their reliance on their on perception. In the end, they will choose to believe what they have witnessed themselves. If a parent or child were to mention that Santa and his magic is fake, the preoperational stage child would not budge from his own