Chapter 13 - The Acquisition of Ideas

James explains how the transition between concrete and abstract activities and thinking might occur and that there is a generally accepted order in which information can be presented such that a child will make use of it to acquire more abstract and complex ideas.

From this position he makes a couple of assertions which are very useful for which I present the following statement:

"It is not till adolescence is reached that the mind grows able to take in the more abstract aspects of experience, the hidden similarities and distinctions between things, and especially their causal sequences. Rational knowledge of such things as mathematics, mechanics, chemistry, and biology, is now possible; and the acquisition of conceptions of this order form the next phase of education. Later still, not till adolescence is well advanced, does the mind awaken to a systematic interest in abstract human relations—moral relations, properly so called,—to sociological ideas and to metaphysical abstractions" (p. 73).

1. Younger children are more attuned to acquire information which has some concrete basis or deals with specific articulable tasks and is also generally accepted to be more attractive to the child.
2. We have to be very careful when explaining abstract concepts to children of a certain age, as their minds are still in a more literal phase and they are more apt to interpret what you explain in varied ways.

I see these things every day in my son. It is so much fun to see how children literally interpret abstract words and concepts into their literal world. This underscores an important point: Many children are neither interested nor able to metabolize abstract concepts or those at higher levels of discourse until they have explored their physical world and concepts that exist therein.

Can you list examples from your own experiences where children have had difficulty understanding abstract or advanced topics? Can you name other scholars who have plugged into this position? What practical advice would you offer teachers with regard to this talk?