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Module 2 - Concrete And Formal Reasoning: Introduction
Module 2 - Concrete And Formal Reasoning: Introduction
Module 2: Concrete and Formal Reasoning
You have just responded to a few puzzles and examined responses of students answering these same puzzles. Observations of many children and adolescents attempting to perform similar tasks have led Jean Piaget and other psychologists to formulate theories concerning the mental processes individuals use to deal with problem situations. In this module, we shall introduce you to the idea of concrete and formal reasoning, a feature of Piaget's theory we consider important for college teachers. Modules 3 and 4 will give you more details and examples to illustrate what we say here. The later modules will introduce you to other …
The Frog Puzzle
Module 2: Concrete and Formal Reasoning
Professor Thistlebush catches 55 frogs and bands the left hind leg before releasing them back into the pond. The next week he captures 72 frogs, of whom 12 have been banded from the previous capture. Estimate how many frogs are in the pond.
Puzzle Analysis Handout
Module 2: Concrete and Formal Reasoning
To give you some specific illustrations of how the reasoning patterns used by students can be related to Piaget's Theory we have prepared the following general analysis of responses to the puzzles in Module 1 and to the Frog Puzzle.