Ohio Assessments for Educators (OAE) Assessment of Professional Knowledge Practice Exam

What stage follows the Preoperational Stage in Piaget’s Developmental Stages?

1. Concrete Operations

2. Formal Operations

3. Sensorimotor

4. Surveillance Stage

The correct answer is: Concrete Operations

The stage that follows the Preoperational Stage in Piaget’s developmental framework is Concrete Operations. This stage typically occurs between the ages of 7 and 11 years and is characterized by the development of logical thinking about concrete events. Children begin to understand the concept of conservation, which refers to the understanding that quantity does not change even when its shape does. During the Concrete Operations stage, children also start to grasp the concepts of classification and seriation, which involve organizing objects based on shared properties and arranging them in a logical order, respectively. This represents a significant advancement in cognitive capabilities compared to the Preoperational Stage, where thinking is primarily intuitive and egocentric, and children have difficulty understanding perspectives other than their own. The other stages mentioned do not directly follow the Preoperational Stage. The Formal Operations stage involves abstract thinking and is generally reached during adolescence, while the Sensorimotor stage occurs from birth to about 2 years and focuses on interaction with the environment through physical actions. Surveillance Stage is not part of Piaget's developmental model.