The next stage is the concrete operational stage which lasts from seven to eleven years of age. It is at this stage that children that children demonstrate the use of logic when dealing with objects and events. Also, because children have begun to understand the concept of reversibility, which is the ability to mentally undo an action , they can complete tasks requiring logic such as conservation, which is the understanding that quantities such as mass remain stable even though their appearance might change. This stage also sees the child moving on from centration to decentration and focusing on the entire problem and not just part of it as seen in the pre-operational stage. Piaget also observed that it is during this stage that children begin to understand the concept of hierarchical classification.

Beyond eleven years the child is said to enter the final stage in cognitive development which is the formal operational stage. The formal operational thinker is able to use imagine and deliberate over objects and events which have never actually been encountered using a more adult form of logical and symbolic thinking and scientific reasoning. They can now form hypotheses and test them in a scientific manner.

Much has been said about the Piaget’s theories and the effect they have on early years teaching and learning. His approaches had great influence throughout the 1960’s, but have since been found to be inadequate in many ways when dealing with children, however Piaget’s work has greatly contributed to the idea of a child’s active role in their learning, and his work is still valued in the we understand how children think and learn. When Piaget’s ideas are used in the application to teaching and learning in the early years, the teacher role is to provide an environment that is rich in stimulation, enabling the child to explore for themselves. The Application of Piaget’s theories should include, the teacher providing the child with the opportunity to construct their own knowledge through their own experiences, use topics, relate something new to what the child already knows and in the use of construction kits and toys to provide the means to explore and learn the properties of objects. We can see from the previous examples that Piaget’s approach can still be seen in our education system, and in teaching and learning in the early years.