LEARN · PRACTISE · DISCOVER
Cognition and Its Processes
When a child looks at a picture, remembers a story, solves a sum or invents a game, they are using cognition. Cognition is at the heart of learning, so understanding its processes helps teachers plan lessons that match how children think. This lesson explains the meaning of cognition and its main processes, as listed in the APTET syllabus: perception, attention, thinking, imagination, reasoning, problem solving, metacognition and creativity.
Meaning of cognition
Cognition means all the mental processes by which we gain, store, transform and use knowledge: perceiving, attending, remembering, thinking, reasoning, imagining, problem solving and using language. The word comes from the Latin cognoscere, “to know”.
Cognitive development is the change in these processes with age and experience. Children do not think like small adults; their thinking is qualitatively different at different stages, as Piaget showed (Lesson 2).
Perception, attention and thinking
Perception
Sensation is receiving information through the senses. Perception is organising and interpreting that information to give it meaning. Two children may see the same diagram but perceive it differently based on their experience. Gestalt psychologists showed that we tend to perceive wholes, grouping items by similarity, proximity and closure.
Attention
Attention is focusing consciousness on a particular stimulus while ignoring others.
| Type | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Involuntary | drawn without effort by a strong stimulus | a loud noise outside the class |
| Voluntary | deliberate effort to focus | concentrating on a maths problem |
| Habitual | attention shaped by interest and habit | a cricket fan noticing match scores |
Factors affecting attention include intensity, size, colour, novelty, movement and change of a stimulus, as well as the learner’s interest, needs, health and fatigue. Young children have short attention spans, so lessons should be broken into short, varied activities.
Thinking
Thinking is mental manipulation of ideas, symbols and images to solve problems or reach conclusions.
- Convergent thinking moves towards one correct answer.
- Divergent thinking generates many possible answers; it is linked with creativity.
- Concrete thinking works with real objects; abstract thinking works with ideas and symbols.
Imagination, reasoning and problem solving
Imagination
Imagination is forming mental images of things not present. It can be reproductive (recalling past experiences) or creative/productive (forming new combinations). Pretend play, storytelling and drawing nourish imagination in young children.
Reasoning
| Type | Direction | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Inductive | from specific examples to a general rule | observing many metals expand when heated, then concluding “metals expand on heating” |
| Deductive | from a general rule to a specific case | “all metals expand on heating; iron is a metal; so iron expands on heating” |
Primary teachers often use the inductive method (examples first, rule later), which suits concrete thinkers.
Problem solving
Steps in problem solving: (1) identify and understand the problem, (2) gather information, (3) form possible solutions (hypotheses), (4) test them, (5) reach and verify a conclusion. Children learn problem solving best through real, meaningful problems.
Metacognition and creativity
Metacognition
Metacognition means “thinking about one’s own thinking”: knowing how one learns and monitoring and controlling one’s learning. The term is associated with John Flavell. A child who says “I don’t understand this paragraph, so I’ll read it again slowly” is using metacognition. Teachers develop it by asking “How did you solve it?” and “What will you do if you get stuck?”
Creativity
Creativity is the ability to produce ideas or products that are both novel and useful. J. P. Guilford linked creativity with divergent thinking, whose features are:
- Fluency: many ideas
- Flexibility: different kinds of ideas
- Originality: unusual, new ideas
- Elaboration: developing ideas in detail
Graham Wallas described four stages of the creative process: preparation, incubation, illumination and verification.
Example
In a Class 5 EVS lesson, the teacher asks, “How many uses can you think of for a plastic bottle?” One child lists ten uses (fluency), across categories like gardening, art and storage (flexibility), including one nobody else thought of (originality), and draws a detailed design for a bottle bird feeder (elaboration).
Exam focus
- Sensation = receiving; perception = interpreting.
- Inductive = examples → rule; deductive = rule → examples.
- Metacognition = thinking about thinking (Flavell).
- Creativity = divergent thinking (Guilford): fluency, flexibility, originality, elaboration; Wallas: preparation, incubation, illumination, verification.
Key takeaways
- Cognition includes all mental processes of knowing and using knowledge.
- Attention can be involuntary, voluntary or habitual; young children’s spans are short.
- Inductive reasoning suits primary learners: examples first, then the rule.
- Metacognition helps learners monitor and improve their own learning.
- Creativity depends on divergent thinking and can be nurtured with open-ended tasks.
Practice
- Organising and interpreting sensory information to give it meaning is called:
- (A) sensation
- (B) attention
- (C) imagination
- (D) perception
- Moving from specific examples to a general rule is:
- (A) deductive reasoning
- (B) inductive reasoning
- (C) convergent thinking
- (D) rote learning
- “Thinking about one’s own thinking” is called:
- (A) metacognition
- (B) imagination
- (C) perception
- (D) maturation
- Fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration are features of:
- (A) convergent thinking
- (B) attention span
- (C) divergent thinking
- (D) rote memory
- Wallas’s stages of creativity are preparation, incubation, illumination and:
- (A) motivation
- (B) verification
- (C) evaluation
- (D) imitation
- Attention drawn to a sudden loud noise without effort is:
- (A) voluntary attention
- (B) habitual attention
- (C) divided attention
- (D) involuntary attention
- A question with only one correct answer mainly demands:
- (A) convergent thinking
- (B) divergent thinking
- (C) creative imagination
- (D) elaboration
- A child says, “I’ll draw a diagram because I understand better that way.” This shows:
- (A) involuntary attention
- (B) reproductive imagination
- (C) metacognitive awareness
- (D) deductive reasoning
Answers and explanations (tap to show)
- (D) Perception organises and interprets what the senses receive; sensation is only receiving it.
- (B) Inductive reasoning moves from particular examples to a general conclusion.
- (A) Metacognition, a term linked with Flavell, means awareness and control of one’s own thinking.
- (C) Guilford described these as features of divergent, creative thinking.
- (B) Verification is the final stage, when the idea is tested and refined.
- (D) Involuntary attention is captured by a strong stimulus without effort.
- (A) Convergent thinking moves towards one correct answer.
- (C) Knowing which strategy helps you learn is metacognitive awareness.