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The key feature of children’s thinking in this stage is symbolic representation. The child is now able to use a symbol, an object, or a word to stand for something else. The use of symbols can be clearly seen in the child’s use of language; for example, the child can now represent objects in the environment with the appropriate word and can refer to past and future events. The use of symbols is also apparent in children’s drawings, imitation, mental imagery, and symbolic play. For example, a preoperational child might be observed feeding her doll imaginary cereal or drawing a picture of the balloons at her last birthday party. Thinking in terms of symbols does permit more flexibility and planning in their problem solving. Despite these increases in cognitive skills, the thought processes of preoperational children result in characteristic differences in reasoning. Because they do not use logical operations, their reasoning often seems flawed to adults. One of the most easily observed differences in how preoperational children reason at this age is the tendency to view the world from one’s own perspective only, a phenomenon that Piaget termed egocentrism. Because of egocentric thinking, preoperational children may “hide” by covering their eyes or only parts of their bodies, believing that if they can’t see the seeker than they, themselves, can’t be seen. Other preoperational reasoning errors result from thinking that is intuitive, rather than logical. For example, preschool children are incapable of conservation – they do not understand that certain properties of objects, such as volume or mass, do not change just because the superficial appearance of the object changes. Preoperational children are not only tied to their perceptions, they are also unable to de-center their thinking, or think about more than one aspect of a problem at a
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Examples: He pedaled. She pedaled. He was pedaling. o Write your anecdotal observational reports in past tense. This means your verbs will often end in “ed”. Examples: Julia played with the trains. Kevin walked from the blocks to the carpet area. Keifer asked the teacher, “May I have my turn now?”
How to record your observation:
Examples: He pedaled. She pedaled. He was pedaling. o Write your anecdotal observational reports in past tense. This means your verbs will often end in “ed”. Examples: Julia played with the trains. Kevin walked from the blocks to the carpet area. Keifer asked the teacher, “May I have my turn now?”
How to record your observation: