Play, Dreams and Imitation in Childhood

"Piaget proposed four major stages to childhood. The first stage of sensory motor development lasted from birth to age two. He observed that when babies play in their cribs and whack at a mobile, they’re learning through play. When they push, grab and shake things, they’re exploring the way the world works through play. His second stage, he called it the preoperational stage, lasts from two to seven. During this stage children are learning to use words and images but they still can’t see abstractly. Piaget felt the concrete operational stage that followed, from seven to 11, was very important. Children begin developing knowledge and solving problems – that’s why they can begin to do their math or geography, they can begin to read. Finally, Piaget felt children would go on to the last stage, which is formal operation. Then they’re much more like adults – they can think abstractly; they’re interested in social issues and morality. Piaget’s books evolved from his observations about his own children. He kept detailed records of everything his children did. Then he began working with children of age six, seven, eight or nine. His experiments generally were small in number but later on in his life he actually did have hundreds of children that he did research on. Sensory motor play was a big part of the first stage – touching, tossing and even putting objects in the mouth. It’s very physical. Then there’s practise play – a child attempts to climb something or open something over and over again until he becomes competent. And finally there’s imaginative play, where the child is able to assimilate ideas from the world and accommodate the concepts to the world of play. For example, using a broom as a hobbyhorse. That’s assimilation. When a child is playing he is assimilating information about the world in his own idiosyncratic way. He also talks about play as compensatory. For example, an older sibling who hides a baby doll when a new child comes home from the hospital. It’s the elder child’s way of saying, “I really don’t want this younger one around.” So here is play as a way of self-healing."