The Four Stages Of Cognitive Development

The development of mind is called cognitive development it means that a part of brain is used for recognising, reasoning, knowing, and understanding. It may also involve what a person knows and the ability to understand, reason and solve problems and also the person’s memory, concentration level, attention level, perception, imagination and creativity. A child’s cognitive development can be promoted by engaging them in quality interactions on everyday basis like talking and naming commonly used objects, by letting them to explore new toys, reading stories and books, singing and most importantly answering there ‘why’ questions all time.

Stages of cognitive development from birth to seven years:

There are four stages of cognitive development

During this stage children learn through sensory experiences, for example, they often put toys, objects in their mouth.

Pre-operational stage: Ages from 2 to 7 years. During this stage, children develop their memory and imagination.

Concrete operational stage: Ages from 7 to 11 years. During this stage children become more aware of external events.

Formal operational stage: Ages from 11 to 16 years. During this stage children use logic to solve problems, takes a look at the world around them and can plan for the future.

The above sensory and pre-operational stages covers the ages of from birth to seven years and the development in this ages is as shown below.

• New born: A newborn baby can feel pain, can even turn to sounds and also turns to the smell of the breast. The baby can focus on objects that are 20cm away. They are sensitive to light.

• One to four months: By one month babies start to smile and answer to smiles and can recognise different speech sounds. By three months they can even imitate low or high pitch voices. By four months babies’ links objects they know with the sounds, e.g. mothers voice and her face. Recognises breast or bottle and can also knows the smell of his or her mothers from other

They use thumb and index fingers to pick up the things. They identify familiar pictures and play alone for more period of time and enjoy making noises by banging toys. Watches an object as it falls and looks for the objects when we try to hide.

• Nine to twelve months: During theses months baby begin to develop images where memory develops and can also remember past. They come to know the daily routine or daily sequence like food time following with nappy change and then bed.

• One to two years: By age one child knows the names of objects and can also follow simple instructions like ‘pick it up’ without any gestures. They start scribbling with crayons or pencils on walls and papers and they can turn pages of a book. They begin to scribble on walls and paper. They often talk to themselves while playing. They might show strong emotions in ‘ temper tantrums’ or bursting into tears. Wishes to share songs, conversations and finger-rhymes more. Builds a tower of five or more blocks and begins to sort shapes and