Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
34th International Geographical Congress, İstanbul, Türkiye, 16 - 20 Ağustos 2021, ss.28-34
The aim of this research is to determine the processes and levels involved in Jean Piaget's spatial development stages of a child through geographical learning theory. It is very important that spatial perception is formed during the child's development process. Geographical education begins to be given to the child in early childhood. Looking at Piaget's theory of development, it is possible to reach the same conclusion again. In determining when children are ready for the introduction of geographic concepts in school, geographic education has been more concerned with the sequence of children's development than with their learning, in a psychological sense. The dominant theoretical paradigm in geographic education is that provided by the noted theorist and researcher in child development, Jean Piaget. In Piaget's view, all cognitive development, including spatial cognition, goes from lower to higher levels of conceptual and symbolic functioning, part of a more general set of competencies acquired in a stagewise, lock-step fashion. For some reason, spatial cognition is important in geography. First of all, spatial cognition provides questions of geographic interest in their own right, given that cognition about space and place is an expression of human-environment or human-world relations. If these queries are asked and questioned by the mind of a child who is still a young mind, it is actually a result of natural selection. For this reason, it is also important for the child to have spatial cognition skills. This research was created to express how spatial cognition levels can be acquired in children in early childhood.
Keywords: Geographical education, Spatial Cognition, Early chilhood.