When first published in 1923, this classic work took the psychological world by storm. Piaget's views expressed in this book, have continued to influence the world of developmental psychology to this day.

Jean Piaget was one of the most salient and inspirational figures in psychological and educational research of the 20th century. He was also prolific, authoring or editing over 80 books and numerous journals and papers which spawned a continuation of his work over the following decades. His work now compromises a major component of many courses on children's psychological development and in a research tradition which is expanding, scholars may need access to the original texts rather than secondhand accounts. This volume is the sixth of nine reproducing Piaget's original works - they are also available as a boxed set.

This is one of a series of four books that forms part of the Open University course on child development. The series provides a detailed and thorough introduction to the central concepts, theories, issues and research evidence in developmental psychology. Cognitive and Language Development in Children gives an up-to-date and accessible account of how thinking and language develop during childhood. The book is innovative in its approach: it starts by considering cognition and language in infants and continues to weave together these two areas in subsequent chapters that cover aspects of their development through childhood. The chapters have been prepared by leading researchers and theorists in collaboration with members of the Open University course team. Building on the themes in The Foundations of Child Development, a previous book within the series, the editors provide a fully up-to-date, broad and engaging overview of the field, ranging from modern understandings of brain architecture and function to the social and cultural contexts of learning. The chapters have many features to assist and facilitate understanding, including defined learning outcomes, research summaries, activities, readings, definitions of key terms and section summaries.

The remarkable way in which young children acquire language has long fascinated linguists and developmental psychologists alike. Language is a skill that we have essentially mastered by the age of three, and with incredible ease and speed, despite the complexity of the task. This accessible textbook introduces the field of child language acquisition, exploring language development from birth. Setting out the key theoretical debates, it considers questions such as what characteristics of the human mind make it possible to acquire language; how far acquisition is biologically programmed and how far it is influenced by our environment; what makes second language learning (in adulthood) different from first language acquisition; and whether the specific stages in language development are universal across languages. Clear and comprehensive, it is set to become a key text for all courses in child language acquisition, within linguistics, developmental psychology and cognitive science.

This book discusses the role of language as a cognitive and communicative tool in a child's early development.