CHILD DEVELOPMENT

Child Development

Child Development

Introduction

Childhood is a time of incredible growth and development. In this stage of life, children grow in various ways. For instance, children develop their physical, social, and emotional skills. In addition, during childhood, children also develop their emotional skills. The favourable conditions in early life of children result in optimal development of children.

The early development of children includes socio-emotional development and emotional development. The developmental goals in early years are to endorse socio-emotional and intellectual development. Socio-emotional development can be defined as the ability of children to interact with their surroundings. Emotional development involves the ability of children to develop and comprehend their feelings towards the environment.

Discussions

This paper is based on the discussion of child development on the basis of certain observations. The sample observed in this study is child p. The child is 3 years 8 months old. The setting of this activity includes a book corner in a day nursery.

In the first observation, the child is observing the adult mixing colour and ingredients to the play dough. It can be evaluated from the observation that the child is developing he cognitive skills. The children from 30-50 months develop their cognitive skills by observing others. Children at this age observe the activities of their adults. In addition, they also try to imitate the activities of adults. The observations demonstrate that the child is developing her cognitive skills that are according to the expectations of her developmental milestone.

From these observations, the other areas of child development can also be observed. For instance, the child is also developing her motor skills by using finger movements. According to (DFES :2007, pg, 113) that states, from 30 -50 months children notice what adults do, imitating what observed and then doing it spontaneously when adult is there or not there. The evidence of these developments is present in the Piaget's theory of cognitive development. According to Piaget, children develop diverse plans on the basis of their experiences. From age 2-7, children develop certain skills by involving themselves in diverse imaginative plays (Piaget, 2002, pp. 266).

The gross development of the child can be observed through her fingers movements. The observation also demonstrates her imaginations and creativity. For instance, the child cut a fish from the play dough.

From the first holistic observation, it has been found that the child is imitating the actions of the adult through eyes coordination and hands movement. It demonstrates that the play dough activity has resulted in the cognitive and motor development of the child. In addition, the child has developed her imaginative and creative skills. Therefore, it is recommended that the child is provided with diverse play dough activities. For instance, she could be provided with the task to cut play dough into different shapes. In addition, the activities such as baking or making cake could also result in the cognitive development of the child.

Play dough is a sensory activity that is calming as well as ...