The Experience of Using a Cognitive Acceleration Approach with Prospective Primary Teachers from Three Chilean Universities

ISSN: 0719-0409 DDI: 203.262, Santiago, Chile doi: 10.7764/PEL.51.2.2014.21 Cognitive Acceleration (CA) programs have been used successfully in the UK and in other countries to promote the development of what Piaget called formal reasoning skills in school students for the last 30 years. Given that the approach has had a tremendous impact on the thinking capabilities of participating students, this study explored the impact of using the program with prospective primary teachers in three Chilean universities. To assess the impact this program had on prospective teachers’ formal reasoning skills, this study used a quasi-experimental design where experimental students were compared with control counterparts in terms of their performance on the Science Reasoning Task test at the beginning and at the end of the intervention. The main findings indicate that, at the end of the Cognitive Acceleration course, prospective teachers from the experimental group demonstrated higher reasoning levels than their peers that did not participate in the program. Abstract