Download child growth and development i - Pratt Educational Services, Inc.

PRINCIPLES IN EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT I
To begin this first module in Child Growth and Development, we must begin with
theories in child development. In order to fully understand child growth and
development you must know where and how the theories of development began.
In your words, what is a theory?
Discuss your answer to that question with your instructor.
Theories lead to predictions that we can test in research; in the process, the theory is
supported or not. When results of research match the predictions, this supports the
theory. When results differ from the predictions, this shows that the theory is incorrect
and needs to be revised. Perhaps now you see why theories are essential for child
development research: They are the source of predictions for research, which often lead
to changes in the theories. These revised theories then provide the basis for new
predictions, which lead to new research, and the cycle continues.
There are five major theoretical perspectives:
1. The Biological Perspective
According to the biological perspective, intellectual and personality development, as well
as physical and motor development, proceed according to a biological plan. One of the
first biological theories, maturational theory, was proposed by Arnold Gesell (1880 –
1961). According to maturational theory, child development reflects a specific and
prearranged scheme or plan within the body. In Gesell’s view, development is simply a
natural unfolding of a biological plan; experience matters little.
How do you feel about that theory? Do you agree with the maturational theory? If yes or
no, explain why.
Other biological theories give greater weight to experience. Ethological theory views
development from an evolutionary perspective. In this theory, many behaviors are
adaptive –they have survival value. Ethological theorists assume that people inherit
many of these adaptive behaviors.
Now looking at both the maturational and ethological theory which one do you believe
most, and why?
Hopefully you have noticed that so far ethological theory seems like maturational theory,
with a dash of evolution for taste. How does experience fit in? Ethologists believe that
all animals are biologically programmed so that some kinds of learning occur only at
certain ages.
A Critical Period – is the time in development when a specific type of learning can take
place; before or after the critical period, the same learning is difficult or even impossible.
One of the best known examples of a critical comes from the work of Konrad Lorenz
(1903-1989), a Nobel-prize-winning Austrian zoologist. Lorenz noticed that newly
hatched chicks follow their mother about. He theorized that chicks are biologically
programmed to follow the first moving object that they see after hatching. Usually this
was the mother, so following her was the first step in imprinting, creating an emotional
bond with the mother.
Ethological theory and maturational theory both highlight the biological bases of child
development. Biological theorists remind us that children’s genes, which are the product
of a long evolutionary history, influence virtually every aspect of children’s development.
2. The Psychodynamic Perspective
This is the oldest scientific perspective on child development, tracing its roots to
Sigmund Freud’s (1856 – 1939) work in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Freud was
a physician who specialized in diseases of the nervous system. Many of his patients were
adults who suffered from ailments that seemed to have no obvious biological cause.
Using his patients’ case histories, Freud created the first psychodynamic theory in
which development is largely determined by how well people resolve conflicts they face
at different ages.
Two aspects of Freud’s theorizing have influenced child development research. The first
was his theory of personality. Freud proposed that personality includes three primary
components that emerge at distinct ages.
1. Id – is a reservoir of primitive instincts and drives
2. Ego – is the practical, rational component of personality
3. Superego – emerges during the preschool years as children begin to internalize adult
standards of right and wrong.
Freud believed that development proceeds best when children’s needs at each stage are
met but not exceeded. If children’s needs are not met adequately, they are frustrated and
reluctant to move to other, more mature forms of stimulation.
Freud’s student, Erik Erikson (1902 – 1994), believed that psychological and social
aspects of development were more important than biological and physical aspects that
Freud emphasized. Erikson proposed a psychosocial theory in which development
consists of a sequence of stages, each defined by a unique crisis or challenge. The
complete theory included eight stages:
Basic trust versus mistrust
0-1
To develop a sense that the
world is safe, a “good place.”
Autonomy versus shame and doubt
1-3
To realize that one is an
independent person who can
make decisions.
Initiative versus guilt
3-6
To develop the ability to try
new things and to handle failure
6-adolescence
To learn basic skills and to
work with others
adolescence
To develop a lasting integrated
sense of confusion self
Intimacy versus isolation
Young
adulthood
To commit to another in loving
relationship
Generativity versus stagnation
Middle
adulthood
To contribute to younger people
through child rearing, child
care, or other productive work
Old age
To view one’s life as
satisfactory and worth living
Industry versus inferiority
Identity versus identity
Integrity versus despair
Give examples of how educators can help children in the first four stages of Erikson’s
psychosocial development.
Whether we call them challenges, crises, or conflicts, the psychodynamic perspective
emphasizes that the trek to adulthood is difficult because the path is strewn with
obstacles. Outcomes of development reflect the manner and ease with which children
surmount life’s barriers. When children overcome early obstacles easily, they are better
able to handle the later ones.
3. The Learning Perspective
Learning theorists champion John Locke’s view the infant’s mind is a blank slate on
which experience writes. John Watson (1878-1958) was the first theorist to apply this
approach to child development. Watson argued that learning determines what children
will be. He assumed that with the correct techniques anything, could be learned by
almost anyone.
Watson did little research to support his claims; B.F. Skinner (1904-1990), filled the gap.
Skinner studied operant conditioning in which the consequences of a behavior
determine whether a behavior is repeated in the future. Skinner showed that two kinds of
consequences were especially influential. Reinforcement is a consequence that increases
the future likelihood of the behavior that it follows.
Name a positive reinforcement you may give a child for cleaning his or her room.
A punishment is a consequence that decreases the future likelihood of the behavior that
it follows.
Give an example of when a punishment would be issued and for what type of behavior.
Skinner’s research was done primarily with animals, but child development researchers
soon allowed that the principles of operant conditioning could be extended readily to
children’s behavior. Applied properly, reinforcement and punishment are indeed
powerful influences on children. However, researchers discovered that children
sometimes learn in ways that are not readily explained by operant conditioning. The
most important of these is that children sometimes learn without reinforcement or
punishment. Children learn much simply by watching those around them, which is
known as imitation or observational learning.
Give examples where children learn by observational learning.
Albert Bandura (1925- ) based his social cognitive theory on this more complex view or
reward, punishment, and imitation. Bandura called is theory “cognitive” because he
believes that children are actively trying to understand what goes on in their world; the
theory is “social” because, along with reinforcement and punishment, what other people
do is an important source of information about the world.
Bandura also argues that experience gives children a sense of self-efficacy,
which refers to children’s beliefs about their own abilities and talents. Self-efficacy
beliefs help determine when children will imitate others. Bandura’s social cognitive
theory is a far from Skinner’s operant conditioning. The operant conditioning child who
responds mechanically to reinforcement and punishment has been replaced by the social
cognitive child who actively interprets events. Nevertheless, Skinner, Bandura, and all
learning theorists share the view that experience propels children along their
developmental journeys.
4. The Cognitive-Developmental Perspective
The cognitive perspective focuses on how children think and how their thinking changes
over time. Jean Piaget (1896 – 1980) was the most influential developmental
psychologist of the 20th century and proposed the best- known of these theories. Piaget
believed that children naturally try to make sense of their world. Throughout infancy,
childhood, and adolescence, youngsters want to understand the workings of both the
physical and the social world.
Piaget argued that in their efforts to comprehend their world, children act like little
scientists in creating theories about the physical and social worlds. They try to weave all
that they know about objects and people into a complete theory. Children’s theories are
tested daily by experience because their theories lead them to expect certain things to
happen. As with real scientific theories grows stronger. Piaget also believed that a few
critical points in development, children realize their theories have basic flaws. When this
happens, they revise their theories radically.
Piaget’s Four Stages of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor
0-2
Infant’s knowledge of the world is
based on senses and motor skills. By
the end of the period, infants uses
mental representations
Preoperational thought
2-6
Child learns how to use symbols such
as words and numbers to represent
aspects of the world, but relates to the
world only through his or her
perspective.
Concrete operational thought
Formal operational thought
7-11
Child understands and applies logical
operations to experiences, provided
they are focused on the here and now.
Adolescence
Adolescent or adult thinks abstractly,
speculates
and
beyond
on
hypothetical situations, and reasons
deductively about what may be
possible
Not all cognitive- developmental theorists view development as a sequence of stages.
Information-processing theorists, for example, draw heavily on how computers work to
explain thinking and how it develops through childhood and adolescence. Just as
computers consists of hardware (disk drives, random-access memory, and central
processing unit) and software (the program we use), information-processing theory
proposes that human cognition consists of mental hardware and mental software. Mental
hardware refers to cognitive structures, including different memories where information
is stored. Mental software includes organized sets of cognitive processes that allow
children to complete specific tasks, such as reading a sentence, playing a video game, or
hitting a baseball. For both Piaget and information –processing theorists, children’s
thinking becomes more sophisticated as children develop.
Describe ways you could help children cognitive skills in Piagets’ stages of cognitive
development.
5. The Ecological Perspective
Most developmentalists agree that the environment is an important force in development.
However, only ecological theories have focused on the complexities of environments and
their links to development. For ecological theory, which gets its name from the branch
of biology dealing with the relation of living things to their environment and to one
another, child development is inseparable from the environmental contexts in which a
child develops. In other words, all aspects of development are interconnected, much like
the threads of a spider’s web are all intertwined. Interconnectedness means that no aspect
of development can be isolated from others and understood independently.
The best known proponent of the ecological approach is Urie Bronfenbrenner (1917 - ).
Bronfenbrenner proposes that the developing child is embedded in a series of complex
and interactive systems. Bronfenbrenner (1979, 1989, 1995) divides the environment
into four levels: the microsystem, the mesosystem, the exosystem, and the macrosystem.
At any point in life, the microsystem consists of the people and objects in an individual’s
immediate environment. These are the people closest to a child, such as parents or
siblings. Some children may have more than one microsystem; for example, a young
child might have the microsystems of the family and of the daycare setting. As you can
imagine, microsystems strongly influence development. We will discuss these four
family systems in more depth in module two.