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Period: to
Infancy
(birth - 2) -
Major physical milestones
- Can hold head up earlier in infancy
- shortly after can begin to sit up without another human support
- closer to the middle of infancy the child will start to crawl or maneuver its way around it's environment
- Later on in infancy the child will start to walk and then closer to the end will have the ability to start running and experimenting with more complex ways to engage in their environment
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Emotional Milestones
- In this stage the infant is able to express basic emotions such as joy, anger, fear, and sadness through facial expressions and typically lots of crying.
- infants respond to their parents familiar voices with smiles which is an expression of emotion
- Infants become able to express laughter
- Very unstable emotionally and can express very quick major changes of emotions in a short timespan
- Able to express jealousy in infancy just not at the beginning.
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Cognitive Milestones
-Representational skills that allow a child to let one thing stand for something else (often occurs during imaginary play) and closer to the end of infancy this begins and this skill isn't even close to perfected
-Improving memory capacity and recognizing something as similar to collected information
-Improving processing speed and response to stimulus -
Challenges and Resolutions
Trust vs Mistrust - Trust between the infant and the caregivers is significant in intellectual and social development. A trusting relationship between an infant and it's caregivers is a major source of security for the infant and it's future framework and relationships. To create a trusting relationship in this timeframe you must figure out ways to ensure that your infant is safe and that it feels safe. -
Major Theories
Obect permanence - Piaget proposes that understanding the properties of objects was one of the foundations of logical thought and a very significant one of these properties is object permanence. Object permanence suggests that objects in the environment are permanent and still exist when out of view. He suggests that infants are only aware of objects that are in a perceptable field. -
Period: to
Toddlerhood
(2-4) -
Cognitive Milestones
- Improves cognitive capacities by beginning to engage in symbolic play, which describes when the toddler starts to use objects to symbolize other objects.
- Can start to understand words and sentences better and follow and understand short directions
- Begins to learn basic numbers and counting abilities
- Just engages problem solving activites especially in an educational environment which improves cognitive abilities
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Major Physical Milestones
- Can climb stairs and walk more accurately and locomotive motion starts to smoothen out
- Starts exploring creative ability like scribbling
- Explores more active play like kicking a ball or running
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Major Theories
Preoperational thought - From the years of 2-5, , Piaget describes the stage of preoperational thought. "During this stage, the sensorimotor schemes that were developed during infancy are represented internally. The most significant achievment of this new stage of cognitive development is the capacity for semiotic or resentational thinking - understanding that one thing can stand for another" (187) -
Emotional Milestones
- Is now able to begin to verbalize emotions and explore new ways to express them
- Can start to express affection in different ways
- Begins to learn empathy not at the beginning of toddlerhood, but begins to know what it means majorly from responsible external influences
- Explores more into guilt and consequences of actions
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Challenges and Resolutions
Autonomy vs Shame and Doubt - This focuses on the challenge of the child developing independence and self control while still healthily relying on their caregivers in the process. For example if a child is learning to become independent with using the bathroom that is good; if they are criticized for having an accident during this training then they may be shameful. Resolutions to Autonomy vs shame and doubt includes parental guardian encouragement to explore independence as well as assistance. -
Period: to
Early school age
(4-6) -
Major Physical Milestones
During this age and timespan, major physical milestones that the child reaches includes:
- Improved coordination
- Improved fine motor skills (practicing things such as drawing and crafts)
- Perform more complex actions like standing on one foot or jumping around with better stance and balance -
Emotional Milestones
Some emotional Milestones during this stage of life includes
- Improved ability to manage and control one's own emotions
- Can get better at recognizing and pinpointing emotions in others
- Major improvement in verbalizing personal feelings and asking for help -
Major Cognitive milestones
Some major Cognitive Milestones during this stage includes:
- Has an improved attention span (Can be heavily influenced by the educational environment)
- Enhanced problem solving skills (especially with numbers and counting)
-Being able to use more complex sentences and have conversations
-Develops improved self concept:
1. More complex self recognition
2. Better self representations
3. Awareness of expectatations for oneself
4. Awareness between difference of self and of others -
Major theories
Self-theory or self-concept: Describes the process through which basic experiences of the physical self are transformed through self awareness, self consciousness, self control, and sense of self. This theory links the child's understanding of the nature of the world, the nature of the self, and the and the meanings of interactions between the two. This theory functions to make transactions between the self and the world result as positively and beneficially as possible. -
Challenges and resolutions
Psychosocial crisis of initiative versus guilt - This crisis highlights the close tie between intellectual curiosity and emotional development. A resolution to this crisis is creating less areas of restriction the child's thinking so they are able to distinghuish better between legitimate and inappropriate areas of investigation. -
Period: to
Middle Childhood
(6-12) -
Major Physical Milestones
- During this time, many children begin to engage in team sports such as soccer or lacrosse etc, and this enhances their motor skills
- Growing interest in physical activity and exploring the body's movements
- Even more complex movement patterns
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Major emotional milestones
- Develop more advanced self-concept -Explore other people's perspectives and more complex empathizing
- Stronger sense of identity
- Improved ability to understand other's emotions
- This timespan is a major stepping stone for independence development
- Increased importance of friendships and feelings of devotion and loyalty to these friendships
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Major Cognitive Milestones
- Concrete operational thinking - Logical thinking applied to the real physical world and physical contents and applying problem solving skills.
- Better at taking in the perspectives of others and understanding the limitations of one's own perspective
- Enhanced memory
- Enhanced reversibility development - Understanding that actions can be reversed and being able to play that out in your head.
- Metacognition - aware of and understanding one's knowledge and thought process; aware of thinking
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Major Theories
Piaget's theory of cognitive development: Concrete operational thought -
Like I discussed in major Cognitive milestones, the concrete operational thought theory emphasizes major Cognitive development in which children are able to apply their logical thinking to the real physical world. Concrete operational thought includes things like reversibility, perspectives, reversibility and conservation. This is only a specific piece from Piaget's theory of cognitive development. -
Challenges and Resolutions
Psychosocial crisis of industry vs inferiority - This crisis highlights the struggle of balancing industry and inferiority at a young age. This means trying to push through challenges and strive for success without giving up and a way to resolve this crisis would be having external support and encouragement in exploring new fields of interests and improving and mastering it instead of giving up and comparing yourself to other people.