Although exploratory play is considered a hallmark of cognitive development and learning, relatively few studies have been able to quantitatively characterize the shifts that may occur in children's approach to exploration. One reason for this gap is due to challenges coding and analyzing children's exploratory play behavior. In our paper, we…

In uncertain situations, individuals rely on prior experiences of successes and failures to guide future decisions. Research has shown that children exposed to early adversity, such as abuse, can exhibit atypical behaviours in probabilistic learning tasks compared to peers without such experiences, which may have long-term behavioural…

The current study is the first to examine the role of exploration in play milestones development using a multi-measure micro-analytic approach. Fifteen infants, between the ages of 8 and 17 months, were observed in their natural home environment once a month for a one--hour session; their spontaneous mouthing and fingering and their play level…

During exploration, young children often show an intuitive sensitivity to uncertainty, despite their strong tendency towards overconfidence in their explicit judgments. Here, we examine the development of children's explicit and implicit recognition of uncertainty using the same stimuli. We presented 4- and 5-year-olds with objects that varied in…

Object exploration is considered a driver of motor, cognitive, and social development. However, little is known about how early childhood education and care settings facilitate object exploration. This study examined if children's exploration of objects during free play was facilitated by the use of particular spatial components (floor, tables,…

The quality improvement of human resources in the society 5.0 era in the 21st century is closely related to technology, and one of the ways this can be achieved is by using YouTube. Therefore, this research determined the differences in student cognitive learning outcomes and critical thinking before and after applying the YouTube-assisted…

A total of 268 primary school children (age 8.75 ± 0.65) spent one day at a wildlife park attending environmental education aiming at high cognitive achievement and motivation alongside maintained discipline. To accomplish this at an out-of-school learning setting, we compared our preferred 'guided learning at workstations' (G) combining the…

Healthy social-emotional growth in infants and toddlers, also known as infant and early childhood mental health (IECMH), provides an essential foundation for early learning, school readiness, and long-term success. Social-emotional development is intertwined with cognitive development. This connection and its role in learning can be observed in…

This research brief explores how emotions and relationships drive learning and are a fundamental part of how our brains develop. The authors explain how emotionally safe and cognitively stimulating environments contribute to brain development; how brain development that supports learning depends on social experiences; and how sensitive periods in…

The authors investigated whether the amount of instructional guidance affects science learning and self-efficacy. Sixty 9- and 10-year-old children were randomly assigned to one of the following three instructional conditions: (a) guided instruction consisting of examples and student-generated explanations, (b) direct instruction consisting of a…

Mirror neurons are increasingly recognized as a crucial substrate for many developmental processes, including imitation and social learning. Although there has been considerable progress in describing their function and localization in the primate and adult human brain, we still know little about their ontogeny. The idea that mirror neurons result…

The impulse to investigate the natural world is deeply rooted in our earliest childhood experiences. This notion has long guided researchers to uncover the cognitive mechanisms underlying the development of scientific reasoning in children. Until recently, however, research in cognitive development and education followed largely independent…

This article examines how children's construction of relationships in exploring materials helps to explain the constructivist foundations of the Reggio Emilia approach. A quasi-naturalistic study of 12 preschool children, ages 3 and 4 years, individually exploring different kinds of collage papers reveals a range of constructivist categories…