Children's interpretive strategies for class inclusion tasks

Abstract

The study examined children's interpretive strategies for verbally presented class inclusion tasks as related to socio-cultural background, age and level of schooling. A total of 298 black and white Zimbabwe primary school children took part in the study. Children's performance was considered both qualitatively and quantitatively. Significant social class related differences in children's skill orientation were found. However, no socio-culturally related differences in children's use of interpretive strategies obtained, although age and level of schooling accounted for a significant proportion of the variance in performance. Implications for psychoeducational practice as well as suggestions for further research are discussed.Since Piaget's (1963Piaget's ( , 1971) clinical observations associated the ability to classify with the developmental ages of 7 or 8 years, children's class inclusion reasoning has been the subject of a growing body of research. Piaget claimed to have demonstrated that during the concrete operations stage (i.e., 7-1 1 years of age), children developed the ability to classify objects on some inclusion criteria. In the typical Piagetian experiment, a child may, for instance, be shown a set of objects (e.g., buttons) divisible into two or more subsets (e.g., by colour, size or shape) and then asked to relate a subset with a more inclusive one (e.g., How many more buttons are there than round buttons?) If a child was able to make the within class observation that there are more buttons than say round buttons, he/she would have demonstrated classification or class inclusion reasoning. In Piaget's theory of the development of knowledge, the significance of class inclusion reasoning as an indicator of cognitive growth lies in that it has been considered a primary sign of the emergence of logical thinking, that occurs together with the abilities of conservation, seriation and transitivity (Inhelder & Piaget, 1964; Piaget, 1971Piaget, , 1977.Amongst the issues that have been considered in related research are, how performance on class inclusion tasks is related to age (e.

Taxonomic structure in early to middle childhood: A longitudinal study with Zimbabwean schoolchildren

“…The 8-year-olds tended to use taxonomic classi cation more than the 5-year-olds. Similar ndings were reported for two samples of Indian tribal children aged 8-9 and 10-11 years (Padhee & Mishra, 1990) and 7-to 11-year-old Zimbabwean children (Mpofu, 1994). Studies that seek to understand the semantic cognitive development of taxonomic structure in children need to take into account the cultural contextual factors, because children are members of cultural linguistic communities, and ''the study of semantic development is basically a problem in the acquisition of culture'' (Nelson, 1985, p.250).…”

Generative Thinking among Young Zimbabwean Children: A Case of the Third Eye

“…Though the two groups involved in this study were both within Piaget's (1964) concrete operational stage (7-llyear-olds), as already argued, some fifth-graders (10-11-year-rolds) could already have attained Piaget's (1964) formal operational thought because, as Mpofu (1994) found out, Zimbabwean school children were capable of advanced classification (and perhaps other tasks) at an earlier stage than Piaget proposed. If this observation is accepted, then the current findings certainly confirm observations by Inhelder and Piaget (1964) that generative thinking is mostly achieved during the formal operational stage.…”

“…Second and fifth-graders were involved in order to assess and compare the development and extent of generative thinking between the two age groups who, according to Inhelder and Piaget, represent a distinct thinking pattern (concrete operational thought). However, it should be noted that fifth-graders could already be in Piaget's (1964) formal operational stage (see Mpofu, 1994).…”

Cognitive process development as measured by an adapted version of Wechsler's Similarities test

“…In principle, it becomes available during the concrete operational stage, which begins at 7 or 8 years old and lasts until age 11. Yet it seems most typical of 9-to 11-year-olds (Mpofu, 1994). In order to give a taxonomic response, one must overcome the perceptual aspects of a word (or object), or "decontextualize" it.…”

“…Concrete words possess many visual traits (Denis, 1979) which, during categorization, present traps for children who have reached the quantification of inclusion stage (Houdé, 1995). Mpofu (1994) analyzed the responses of 7-, 9-and 11-year-olds, given in a Wechsler-related similarities test, depending on whether they were instrumental (functional) or analytic (abstract). These two types of answers correspond to schematic (using an object) and taxonomic (superordinate category) answers, respectively.…”