(See related pages)
Below are the key terms featured in this chapter. The textbook's full glossary is also available for online searching.
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| Animism | Belief that inanimate objects have "lifelike" qualities and are capable of action |
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| Basal metabolism rate (BMR) | The minimum amount of energy a person uses in a resting state |
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| Centration | The focusing of attention on one characteristic to the exclusion of all others |
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| Child-centered kindergarten | Education that involves the whole child by considering all aspects of development |
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| Conservation | In Piaget’s theory, awareness that altering an object’s appearance does not change its basic properties |
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| Developmentally appropriate practice | Education that focuses on the typical developmental patterns of children and on the uniqueness of each child |
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| Egocentrism | Inability to distinguish one's own perspective from that of someone else |
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| Intuitive thought substage | Piaget’s second substage of preoperational thought |
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| Montessori approach | Educational philosophy in which children have freedom and spontaneity |
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| Myelination | The process in which the nerve cells are covered and insulated with a layer of fat cells to increase the speed that information travels through the nervous system |
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| Operations | In Piaget’s theory, an internalized set of actions that allows children to do mentally what they formerly did physically |
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| Scaffolding | In a teaching session, a skilled person adjusts guidance to fit a child's current performance level |
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| Short-term memory | The memory component in which individuals retain information for 15 to 30 seconds |
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| Social constructivist approach | Emphasizes the social contexts of learning |
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| Symbolic function substage | Piaget’s first substage of preoperational thought |
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| Theory of mind | Individuals' thoughts about how mental processes work |
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| Zone of proximal development (ZPD) | Vygotsky’s term for the range of tasks too difficult for children to master alone but that can be mastered with assistance |