Stimulating the development of thinking abilities
How can we stimulate the growth of general thinking? In the 1980s, Piaget’s idea that thinking
develops through distinct stages fell into some disrepute because it was occasionally misused
to identify what children could not do. The idea can also be used positively, however;
understanding the type of thinking that individual children are using enables us to design
activities that will move them on towards higher levels of thinking. This is the process that is
described as ‘cognitive acceleration’. There are three main drivers of cognitive acceleration —
three conditions that work together to maximise the intellectual growth of children. These are
described below.
Cognitive conflict
Piaget suggested that experiences that are puzzling to a child, and cannot be easily explained,
may stimulate the development of more powerful ways of thinking. It can therefore be
worthwhile to provide children with activities and experiences that challenge their current
understanding and are somewhat difficult for them to solve at the moment. Of course, each
activity has to be well managed and pitched at the correct level of difficulty, neither so easy
that it provides no challenge, nor so difficult that it alienates the children.
Social construction
Faced with a problem, the natural human instinct is to talk about it — this is why, in the adult
world, we frequently set up committees or ‘think tanks’ to solve problems. Our assumption is
that ‘many heads are better than one’. In some school settings, however, collaboration is
viewed less positively; it may even be construed as ‘cheating’. In cognitive acceleration, we
actively encourage children to work together to solve problems. This process — ‘social
construction’ of understanding — is recognised in psychology, the most well-known proponent
of the idea being Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934).
Metacognition
The third driver for cognitive acceleration, derived indirectly from both Vygotsky and Piaget, is
conscious ‘thinking about your own thinking’ — which is known as ‘metacognition’. Active
reflection on progress in solving a particular problem, on difficulties encountered, on wrong
turns taken and how they were corrected, can stimulate the development of improved thinking.
Three pillars of cognitive acceleration
This approach to the stimulation of intelligence in children can be summarised as follows:
• provide a challenging activity (cognitive conflict);
• encourage a social approach to tackling it (social construction);
• help children to think back to the thinking they employed (metacognition).
Cognitive conflict, social construction and metacognition are collectively described as ‘three
pillars of cognitive acceleration’.