Piaget's Child Observation

Charlie is a lively and fun 20-month-old child that is bursting with personality. I observed Charlie in the comforts of his own home, along with his mother, in the early evening. Charlie is able to walk and is starting to develop some language and approximations for items (example: “vroom” for motorcycle). He is an only child and has a really positive relationship with both of his parents, who have exposed him to three languages (via his grandparents)—English, Dutch, and Spanish. I have known Charlie’s mother for a few years, so he is pretty familiar and comfortable with me. I arrived right as he returned home after he had spent the entire afternoon playing at his grandparents’ home and was told he skipped his midday nap. I first began my observation casually seated at their dining room table as he played and snuggled with his mother in the living room. The second half of my observation was spent interacting with Charlie in his play area of the living room; this portion of the session gave me a really clear idea on whether or not Charlie was meeting the expected milestones of development. According to Piaget’s …show more content…
He engaged in the three key behaviors relating to gesture development: showing, giving, and pointing. He would point to images in the book his mother and him were reading that he was interested in and wanted his mother to talk about. This shows he was using those points by means of gaining attention and regulating joint action. He would give me different toys he wanted me to interact with showing examples of giving. When Charlie asked for “agua”, he pointed to my water bottle, which is an example of using a mixture of gestures and words. I was able to elicit an emblem gesture when Charlie gave me a fist bump with some prompting. I was not able to observe any gesture-word combinations during my session with