September Sturgin
Mrs. Sarah Bernes
CFS 205
06 February 2016

Task stream Assignment #2

Cognitive learning is an essential part of the developmental process; it is the way our brains process information received. It is important to understand how the cognitive learning process changes throughout the human life span to fully comprehend the way we think and process information. Psychologist Jean Piaget, was the most influential theorist who described the cognitive development process. Piaget, “envisioned a child's knowledge as composed of schemes, basic units of knowledge used to organize past experiences and serve as a basis for understanding new ones” (Encyclopedia). Furthermore, in a human’s life span there are eight stages in which our cognitive learning changes: infancy, early childhood, middle childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle adulthood and late adulthood. This essay will take a look at the changes in cognitive learning over the human lifespan.
The first stage we will look at is cognitive learning in infancy. The stage of infancy is considered birth through age two years old. Cognitive learning begins immediately after birth, infants learn to use their senses to explore their surroundings (Encyclopedia). Newborns are really good at identifying sounds and recognizing their mother’s voice. As the infant grows they begin to understand words; around the age of 18 months old the infant should be able to understand between 100 and 150 words.
The next stage is early childhood; the age range is from two years old to six years old. At this stage in a child’s cognitive learning process they begin to use their memory and imagery skills (Encyclopedia). A child will develop skills and knowledge to assist them in social play with their peers. When children engage in social play they are able to gain even more knowledge by observing and interacting with