Child Development Essay

There are many different theories about how children develop, including but not limited to innate desires the child is born with, how the parent behaves towards the child, and how people interact with the child. Some of the major names in the field of child development include Freud, Erikson, Watson, Skinner, Bandura, Piaget, Vygotsky and Bronfenbrenner. While all theses theorists help to explain child development, I believe that Watson, Bandura, and Piaget best explain why my parenting choices are the way they are. John Watson’s theory of behaviorism focuses on the ideas that anything can be learned and the idea that behavior is shaped by other people’s responses (Arnett 22). I believe that his theory plays a role in why I’ve been choosing what I have been for Todd. A prime example of this would be that from the first few months of Todd’s life it was evident that he was an active child (virtual child). Because of this, I chose to encourage his levels of activity. Since Todd seemed to enjoy being active, I kept encouraging it (virtual child). This fits with Watson’s idea that my behavior is shaped by the way others (in this cause, Todd) react (Arnett 22).…

Child development can be defined as the psychological and biological changes that happen in children between birth and the end of adolescence. There are certain steps in development that each child takes however, each child progresses at a different rate. While observing I saw this to be the case, my child observation was on a fifteen-month, year old boy named Hunter. By this age a child should be walking and saying at least five words. These words include mama, Dada, dog, ball, no. Along with…

Development of the human is a continuously ongoing process. This is true in the fact that a human begins to grow and mature from conception until death. It is seen in the rapid growth of a fetus to the wise words of our elders. However, one of the most critical periods of postpartum development occurs in childhood (Berk, 2014). Children are evolving on all of the multiple planes of human development and at a significant rate. And in that critical period of development, parents/legal guardians…

children’s lives. The first five years is when children learn the most; by age three a child’s development reaches eighty percent. As James and Nelson express “brain development is a complex set of processes that begin within a few weeks of contraception and continue until adulthood” (as cited in Holden, 2014, p. 189). Without healthy growth, a child can have many learning, behavior problems even mental and health problems. It is consequential, that parents promote healthy development. There are…

There are a lot of complex pieces to a child’s development both cognitively and physically with many intertwining systems and mechanisms. “Child-development researchers usually examine different domains or areas of development, such as physical growth, cognition, language, and social relationships” (Barnfield & Kail, 2012, p.19). In this paper, the child was observed and assed based on five different domains which includes physical growth, cognitive domain, emotional domain, social and…

Article I Background It is known that socioeconomic status (SES) impacts both structural and functional brain development in childhood, but before this study, it was never tested how early the signs of impact could be detected. The earliest study of impact tested sixteen to thirty-six-month-old infants in their language and cognitive skills and predicted their language improvement for the next three years (Gou, Choudhury, & Benasich, 2011). Another study observed the effects of low SES by…

Cognitive development is a very essential development for children because an expansion occurs of a child’s intellectual or mental abilities in this development. The child begins to process information or begin to recognize the environment. I child turning around to their mother’s voice is an example how the child recognizes a familiar voice. Children begin to organize information and use if appropriately. One of Piaget theories is how he believed that intelligence was not random, but was a set…

Children especially babies often do things that are funny or silly or make people laugh but their actions are not only for people’s entertainment as they put their feet in their mouths, they are developing, learning and changing. When observing an infant of seven months one can learn a great deal about their development and how complex each motion and action is. I observed several key concepts of the physical, cognitive, psycho-social and psycho-emotional development of an infant. Each of these…

Researches and many child development theorists suggests play to be an increasingly more varied and complex activity with significant influence on the physical, cognitive and social development of children (Kearns 2010). A balance between both types of play, structured and unstructured, can significantly benefit children in their development. Children attempt achieving pre-existing objectives set by an adult in structured play while establishing their own objectives in free/unstructured play…

An ideal learning environment in a child development center is one that stimulates a child’s cognitive, language, social, emotional, fine motor, gross motor, and sensory skills through developmentally appropriate practices that enhances creativity. Meaning early childhood educators must plan their lesson plan activities, select their classroom materials, and design their classroom floor plan to meet the developmental needs of the children in the classroom in a fun inventive way. In this paper,…