Kaylie's Four Stages Of Cognitive Development

For this assignment, I chose to use my daughter, Kaylie who is a sixteen-year-old high school sophomore, as the participant. Before starting the activity, I asked her a series of questions that included “What is thinking?”, “What is learning?”, “What do you do when you need to remember something?”, “What things do you do in your head when you are trying to study for a test?”, and “Do you have any certain study techniques that you use when studying for a test or trying to learn new information?” These questions were examples of suggestions to use for this activity, and I also chose to include an additional question regarding study techniques. In response to the questions asked prior to the activity, Kaylie responded by interpreting to me that thinking is mental brainstorming and learning is the act of taking in new information to use for a purpose. Additionally, she explained that prior to studying she will clear her mind and think about what she is about to study. When trying to remember information, she expressed that she will sometimes …show more content…
Individuals within this final stage of development will be able to apply logical reasoning to abstract ideas as well as concrete objects and situations. Moreover, their capability for advanced reasoning increases. While observing her perform this task, it was obvious to me that she was able to apply logical reasoning skill by instinctively knowing the cups would need to be stacked in some manner. As a result of Kaylie’s developmental stage, her metacognition gives her the ability to know what sort of behaviors and cognitive processes best suit her to maximize her memory and learning. During the cups and pennies activity, Kaylie was able to transfer what she knew about division as well as use critical thinking and logical reasoning skills to aid her in finding an accurate