Developing Mind Series – serie

This book provides a thrilling description of preliterate children's developing ideas about writing and numerals, and it illustrates well the many ways in which cultural artifacts influence the mind and vice versa. Remarkably, children treat writing and numerals as distinct even before they have received any formal training on the topic, and well before they learn how to use writing to represent messages and numerals to represent quantities.In this revolutionary new book, Liliana Tolchinsky argues that preliterate children's experiences with writing and numerals play an essential and previously unsuspected role in children's subsequent development. In this view, learning notations, such as writing is not just a matter of acquiring new instruments for communicating existing knowledge. Rather, there is a continual interaction between children's understanding of the features of a notational system and their understanding of the corresponding domain of knowledge. The acquisition of an alphabetic writing system transforms children's view of language, and the acquisition of a formal system of enumeration transforms children's understanding of numbers.Written in an engaging narrative style, and richly illustrated with historical examples, case studies, and charming descriptions of children's behavior, this book is aimed not only at cognitive scientists, but also at educators, parents, and anyone interested in how children develop in a cultural context.

The purpose of Remembering the Times of Our Lives: Memory in Infancy and Beyond is to trace the development from infancy through adulthood in the capacity to form, retain, and later retrieve autobiographical or personal memories.It is appropriate for scholars and researchers in the fields of cognitive psychology, memory, infancy, and human development.

How do children develop an understanding of people as psychological entities - as feeling, thinking beings? How do they come to understand human behavior as driven by desires and informed by reason? These questions are at the heart of contemporary research on children’s "theories of mind." Although there has been an enormous amount of research on this topic, nobody - until now - has provided a coherent account that traces the development of theory of mind from birth to five years.This book begins by analyzing the nature of commonsense psychology and exploring the developmental processes relevant to its development. It then describes the manner in which the child moves from being a newborn with perceptual sensitivities to people, to an infant who can share psychological experiences with others, to a young child who can recognize people, including both self and others, as individual psychological beings. Finally, the book shows how, throughout this developmental process, the child’s social interactive experiences are used by the child to generate ever more sophisticated forms of commonsense psychology.The Development of Commonsense Psychology incorporates material from a wide range of research on early development, including infant social interaction, joint attention, self development, language development, theory of mind, and autobiographical memory.Suitable as a text for senior undergraduate/honors courses or graduate level courses in early development, the primary audience for this book is developmental psychologists. However, it is also written in a way that will make it accessible and appealing to anyone with an interest in social cognitive development in early childhood, including parents, educators, and policymakers.

This book provides a thrilling description of preliterate children's developing ideas about writing and numerals, and it illustrates well the many ways in which cultural artifacts influence the mind and vice versa. Remarkably, children treat writing and numerals as distinct even before they have received any formal training on the topic, and well before they learn how to use writing to represent messages and numerals to represent quantities.In this revolutionary new book, Liliana Tolchinsky argues that preliterate children's experiences with writing and numerals play an essential and previously unsuspected role in children's subsequent development. In this view, learning notations, such as writing is not just a matter of acquiring new instruments for communicating existing knowledge. Rather, there is a continual interaction between children's understanding of the features of a notational system and their understanding of the corresponding domain of knowledge. The acquisition of an alphabetic writing system transforms children's view of language, and the acquisition of a formal system of enumeration transforms children's understanding of numbers.Written in an engaging narrative style, and richly illustrated with historical examples, case studies, and charming descriptions of children's behavior, this book is aimed not only at cognitive scientists, but also at educators, parents, and anyone interested in how children develop in a cultural context.

Writing a book about recess could be a very questionable endeavor for a serious academic psychologist. At first blush it seems to be a pretty trivial topic. It's the time during the school day where there's a break from what's typically considered the most serious work of the day--reading, writing, and arithmetic. Reflecting this trivial tenor, it's also that time of the school day that kids--perhaps only half jokingly--say is their favorite part of school. This perception has lead many schools to question the role of recess in the school day. This book is an attempt to broach two views of recess--the perceived value of recess and the movement to eliminate or reduce the school recess period from the primary school day.Due to tightened school budgets and the emphasis on testing, many elementary schools eliminate recess, gym classes, and play periods to the developmental detriment of the very children the schools are supposed to serve. Author Anthony Pellegrini has conducted a number of careful studies regarding student attentiveness and performance within programs that have recess periods, and those that don't. The data show that students need recess in order to blow off energy and interact with each other in the unstructured recess environment in order to grow socially. The goal of Recess is to help readers realize the importance of recess and counter the trend to eliminate it from schools.This book appeals to academics, teachers, administrators, and parents.

Writing a book about recess could be a very questionable endeavor for a serious academic psychologist. At first blush it seems to be a pretty trivial topic. It's the time during the school day where there's a break from what's typically considered the most serious work of the day--reading, writing, and arithmetic. Reflecting this trivial tenor, it's also that time of the school day that kids--perhaps only half jokingly--say is their favorite part of school. This perception has lead many schools to question the role of recess in the school day. This book is an attempt to broach two views of recess--the perceived value of recess and the movement to eliminate or reduce the school recess period from the primary school day.Due to tightened school budgets and the emphasis on testing, many elementary schools eliminate recess, gym classes, and play periods to the developmental detriment of the very children the schools are supposed to serve. Author Anthony Pellegrini has conducted a number of careful studies regarding student attentiveness and performance within programs that have recess periods, and those that don't. The data show that students need recess in order to blow off energy and interact with each other in the unstructured recess environment in order to grow socially. The goal of Recess is to help readers realize the importance of recess and counter the trend to eliminate it from schools.This book appeals to academics, teachers, administrators, and parents.

The purpose of Remembering the Times of Our Lives: Memory in Infancy and Beyond is to trace the development from infancy through adulthood in the capacity to form, retain, and later retrieve autobiographical or personal memories.It is appropriate for scholars and researchers in the fields of cognitive psychology, memory, infancy, and human development.

How do children develop an understanding of people as psychological entities - as feeling, thinking beings? How do they come to understand human behavior as driven by desires and informed by reason? These questions are at the heart of contemporary research on children’s "theories of mind." Although there has been an enormous amount of research on this topic, nobody - until now - has provided a coherent account that traces the development of theory of mind from birth to five years.This book begins by analyzing the nature of commonsense psychology and exploring the developmental processes relevant to its development. It then describes the manner in which the child moves from being a newborn with perceptual sensitivities to people, to an infant who can share psychological experiences with others, to a young child who can recognize people, including both self and others, as individual psychological beings. Finally, the book shows how, throughout this developmental process, the child’s social interactive experiences are used by the child to generate ever more sophisticated forms of commonsense psychology.The Development of Commonsense Psychology incorporates material from a wide range of research on early development, including infant social interaction, joint attention, self development, language development, theory of mind, and autobiographical memory.Suitable as a text for senior undergraduate/honors courses or graduate level courses in early development, the primary audience for this book is developmental psychologists. However, it is also written in a way that will make it accessible and appealing to anyone with an interest in social cognitive development in early childhood, including parents, educators, and policymakers.