Child Learning and Development in Personal Social & Emotional Developmental Context



Child Learning and Development in Personal Social & Emotional Developmental Context

The basic objective of the development of your child is to enable them in the beginning years of their lives to become deeply involved and self-directive in their learning. This requires first a positive image as a person, since there is a 'circular process' of interaction between learning and personality development (Bronfenbrenner, 2005). Each child's development is judged by their intellectual functioning, their ego strength, their inventiveness, their relatedness to peers and adults, and their capacity to cope with new events that cross their path each day within their social life.

This observation took place at a friends' house, and for the observation I used her, almost, 2 year old daughter Kathy. Kathy is Caucasian, born in Syria, but her parents are both from the United Kingdom. During the observation only the mother was present.

I started the observation at 4 pm on a Thursday afternoon. Before I started I explained to the mother what the purpose was of my observation and that she had to interact with Kathy as she normally would and that she should not make Kathy aware that she was being observed. The observation was as follows:

4.00 PM - Kathy sits in a big chair in front of the television ready to watch Teletubbies.

4.02 PM - Kathy makes herself more comfortable by taking a pillow from another chair and lay-down in the chair in which she already sat. She is restless, looks a few times in my directions but decides that the Teletubbies are more interesting at this particular point.

4.05 PM - Kathy asks her mother for a drink by saying 'drink, please'.

4.06 PM - Kathy receives the drink from her mother, then 'demands' a biscuit with her drink. Her mother tells her to ask nicely. Kathy is quiet for a while and than says 'please'.

4.08 PM - Kathy sits down again, gives her mother a hug when she receives her biscuit and eats her biscuit. During her eating she watches the television.

4.10 PM - Kathy starts to imitate one of the characters on television. She is not watching the screen anymore but is busy with her own play. The character she is trying to imitate is bending down, looking between its legs to see the world up-side-down. Kathy is trying to do the same.

4.13 PM - Kathy's mother is asking her what she is doing. Kathy tries to explain to her mother that she wants to do like the character on television by looking between her legs to see things up-side-down. Kathy's mother is joining her and together they are bending down and look through at each other through their legs. Kathy finds this very amusing and laughs a lot.

4.18 PM - Kathy's attention is drawn back to the television as a dog appears on the screen. Kathy points at the screen and says 'dog'. Kathy's mother confirms that it is a dog by saying 'Yes that ...