Physical and Cognitive Development in Early Childhood

1
Physical and Cognitive Development in Early
Childhood

• Chapter 7

2
Body Growth

• Slower growth rate than during infancy
• 2 to 3 inches in height and about 5 pounds in
  weight each year
• Boys slightly larger than girls
• Baby fat drops
• By end of preschool years children begin to lose
  primary baby teeth
• Important to care for teeth
• Childhood tooth decay is high for low SES
  children (poor diet, lack of flouridation and
  inadequate health and dental care

3
Children and High Fat Foods

• 34 of energy in Americas diet is derived from
  fat
• In course of school day, most eaten foods (candy,
  potato chips, cheese, peanut butter) contains at
  least 50 of fat
• Childrens food preferences are influenced by
  what adults eat
• Certain foods (high in fat) should be discouraged
  as a means for rewards with children
• Health foods as rewards may be viewed as
  something to endure not to enjoy

4
Brain Development

• Between 2 and 6 years the brain increases from 70
  to 90 percent of its adult weight
• Left hemisphere- growth between 3 to 6 years and
  levels off-language skills
• Right hemisphere- spatial skills (drawing,
  recognizing shapes) develops gradually over
  childhood and adolescence

5
Lateralization and Handedness

• Dominant cerebral hemisphere- an individuals
  strong hand preference reflecting the greater
  capacity of one side of the brain
• Right handers- 90 of population- language and
  hand control in left side of brain
• Lefties- 10 of population- language shared in
  both hemispheres
• Ambidextrous- let preferred but can be skillful
  with right hand
• Hand preference of twins relate to body position
  during prenatal period
• Small number of lefties show developmental
  problems

6
Emotional Well-being

• Preschoolers with very stressful home lives
  suffer more respiratory and intestinal illnesses
  and injuries do to accidents
• Deprivation dwarfism- growth disorder that
  appears between 2 and 15 years of age and is
  caused by the interference with the production of
  the growth hormone due to emotional deprivation-
  short stature, low weight in relation to height,
  decrease hormone production (GH)
• Removal from emotionally inadequate environment
  GH levels return to normal delay in treatment
  can cause permanent dwarfism

7
Nutrition

• Picky eaters and unpredictable eating pattern are
  not uncommon in preschool years
• Decline in appetite is normal-slower growth
• Wariness to new foods- adaptive skill in learning
  safety of foods
• Preschoolers need high quality diet- fats, oils,
  sugars to a minimum
• Common dietary deficiencies in preschool years-
  iron (anemia, calcium-bones and teeth Vitamin
  A-eyes, skin and internal organs Vitamin C-
  immune system, iron absorption and wound healing

8
Nutrition contd

• Encouraging Good Nutrition in Children
• Page 215

9
Immunizations

• Childhood immunizations- polio, measles, mumps,
  rubella (German measles) pertussis (DTP)
  (whooping cough) diphteria, tetanus, hepatitis B,
  and chicken pox.
• Infants- first 5 diphteria, tetanus, and DTP
  injections at 2 months
• Polio vaccine in 3 injection series starting at 2
  months
• Measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) given at 15
  months- single shot
• Hep B 3 shots starting at birth
• Chicken pox as early as 12 months
• Irritable, less energetic, low grade fever not
  beyond 24 hrs
• 1 chance of serious side effects
• 4 out of 10 people who get tetanus die 1 out of
  100 babies under 6 months who get pertussis dies

10
Cognitive Development Preoperational Stage-Piaget

• Piagets preoperational stage- children are not
  capable of mental actions that obey logical rules

11
Make Believe Play

• Increases in early childhood
• Becomes increasing detached form real life
  situations associated with it
• Less directed on self and begins to focus on
  objects
• Gradually contains more complex scheme
• Sociodramatic play- combines scheme and includes
  role playing of childrenn

12
Egocentrism

• Inability to imagine the perspectives of others
  and reflect on their own thinking
• Leads to illogical features of thought
• Animistic thinking- belief that inanimate objects
  have lifelike qualities
• Magical thinking
• Rigid thinking and illogical nature of young
  childrens thinking

13
Conservation

• Certain physical characteristics of objects
  remain the same even when their outward
  appearance changes
• Preschoolers have not yet developed this concept
• Understanding is centered (one aspect of
  situation
• Perception- bound ( easily distracted by the
  appearance of objects)
• Focus on states rather than transformations
  (focus on beginning and end states
• Irreversibility- can not revise steps in a
  problem to get to the beginning

14
Conservation contd

• Recently 2 year old Brookes father shaved off
  his thick beard and mustache. When Brooke saw him
  she was very upset. Using Piagets theory,
  explain why Brooke was upset by her fathers
  appearance

15
Vygotskys Sociocultural Theory

• Social context of cognitive development
• Rapid growth in language in early childhood
• Paritcipation in culturally meaningful tasks

16
Private Speech

• Piaget called childrens utterances to
  themselves- egocentric speech
• Vygotsky- children speak to themselves for
  self-guidance and self-direction (private speech)
• Private speech is used more often when tasks are
  difficult or when a child is confused about how
  to proceed

17
Zone of Proximal Development

• A range of tasks too difficult for the child to
  do alone but that can be accomplished with the
  help of others
• Adults and more skilled peers can assist with
  development through dialogue

18
Zone of Proximal Development contd

• Tanisha sees her 5 year old son Toby talking to
  himself when he plays. Should she discourage this
  behavior? Use Vygoskys theory to support your
  answer.

19
Attention

• Preschoolers spend short time on activities
• Average time for single activity in preschool- 7
  minutes
• Attention more planful by end of preschool years

20
Memory

• Age 2 recall is 1 to 2 items
• Age 4 recall is 3 or 4 items
• Recall is poorer than recognition
• Young children are less able to use memory
  strategies- mental activities that improve
  chances of remembering
• Children remember in terms of scripts
• Childrens memory can be assisted by discussing
  past events, asking questions, and providing
  elaborate information

21
Language Affects Memory

• First verbs in childrens vocabulary
• Think, remember, and pretend
• By age 4 children understand that beliefs and
  reality can differ- people can hold false beliefs
• Young children believe that all events must be
  directly observed to be known

22
Literacy

• Preschoolers understand a great deal about
  written language long before they learn to read
  or write in conventional ways
• Preschoolers are aware of some ideas about
  symbols but may revise these ideas as their
  perceptual and cognitive capacities improve and
  as they encounter writing in many different
  contexts.

23
Mathematical Reasoning

• Built on foundation of informally acquired
  knowledge
• Early years- big, little, small, lots
• Between 2 yrs and 3 yrs they begin to count-
  memorization
• 3 yrs to 4 yrs- one to one correspondence
• 4 yrs and 5 yrs- cardinality- last number in a
  counting sequence indicates the quantity of items
  in a set
• By end of preschool- count on concept
• Eventually later develop count down concept

24
Preschool and Daycare

• Over 30 years the number of young children in
  preschool has increased steadily
• Due to large number of women in workforce
• Types of preschools- child centered preschools,
  academic programs

25
Early Intervention

• Project Head Start- 1965 for children with Low
  SES
• Encourages parental involvement
• Children in Head Start scored higher in IQ and
  school achievement than controls during first 2
  to 3 years of elementary school
• Less likely to be placed in special education or
  retained a grade and a greater number graduated
  from high school
• Good child care can reduce negative impact of an
  underprivileged home life

26
Important Factor For Good Childcare

• Group size
• Caregiver to child ratio
• Caregivers educational preparation
• Caregivers personal commitment to learning about
  and caring for children

27
Television

• Sesame Street works as an academic tutor
• TV can support cognitive development as long as
  childrens viewing is not excessive and programs
  meet developmental needs

28
Language

• By age 2, 200 words
• BY age 6, 10,000 words
• Fast-mapping- connecting a new word with an
  underlying concept after only a brier encounter
• Preschoolers extend language meanings through
  metaphor

29
Grammar

• The way we combine meaningful phrases and
  sentences
• 2 and 3 yrs old English speakers use simple
  sentences- subject verb order
• Overregularization- by about 3.5 children learn
  many grammar rules and may use them in error
• Difficulty with passive form

30
Pragmatics

• Preschoolers are learning how to use appropriate
  communication tools effectively
• By age 4 children know culturally accepted ways
  of adjusting speech to fit age, sex, and social
  status role of persons

31
Pragmatics contd

• One day Sammys mother explained to him that the
  family would take a vacation in Miami. The next
  morning Sammy emerged from his room with his
  belongings spilled out of a suitcase and
  remarked, I gotted my bag packed. When are we
  going to Your-ami? What do Sammys errors
  reveal about his approach to language?