On becoming a thinker: A psychoeducational model

An early‐childhood educational program is presented that has as its major mission the fostering of representational thinking. The program is theoretically based, derived from a Piagetian perspective, with particular emphasis on a class of social experiences that is assumed to be necessary, although not sufficient, for enhancing representational thought. This class of behavior is called distancing behavior. Distancing behaviors serve to create temporal and/or spatial and/or psychological distance between the speaker and the listener. To capture the impact of the program, the theoretical foundations are presented, followed by a detailed description of the class of social experiences deemed critical, and finally a hypothesis that these social experiences are in fact critical. Data arc presented showing that the class of social experiences effective in the educational milieu arc equally effective when examined in the context of the family.