Development in the Preschool Years Oca

Development in the Preschool Years

Five factors

1. Environment: In the early stages of development children absorb everything. Their like little sponges; they take in everything around them, which creates values and beliefs for life. Children need to be nurtured in a positive physical environment to encourage academic success. However some children are subjected to negative physical environments such as neglect and abuse. Each of the environments is evident in the child's overall emotional and physical development. http://www.ehow/info_8116530 physical-environmental-factors-child-development.html

2. Health- Eating Habits: Most Children are picky eaters preferring certain foods with some only eating fast foods and junk foods or refusing to eat all together. These eating habits may reduce a child's development and growth.

3. Playing: A child's play helps them learn to get along with others, while developing their imagination.

4. Medical conditions: Problems affecting the brain may hinder a child's development.

5. Sleep: Children need plenty of sleep to grow and develop correctly. Children need to take naps preferably in the morning and afternoon as well as sleeping through the night. Lack of sleep reduces a child's energy. Poor sleeping habits cause a child's daytime behavior to be worse. Naps during the day will help, but it is also very important that a child sleeps more at night. http://www.drugs.com/normal-growth-and-development-of preschoolers.html

2. Infants grow very fast a preschoolers growth is much slower. Average children ages 2 to 5 grow about 2 ½ inches and gain around 4 or 5 pounds a year. Because the child grows at a slower rate they may eat less. During the preschool period it is a great time to teach a child to eat a proper diet, which leads to a healthy life style. Good habits and attitudes toward nutrition learned by preschoolers are likely to continue throughout life. Nutritional problems may occur due to the young child only eating self-selected foods. When parents force a child the child is less likely to try new foods. Picky eating is most often temporary and will disappear if it is not reinforced by unnecessary rules and emotions. Food should never be used as a bribe or a punishment. If a child refuses to eat certain foods don't make an issue of it because this may make the child determined to refuse foods offered. If a child refuses foods try to get them to eat it a different time. It's okay to let a child dislike certain foods. When preparing foods keep the child in mind make food that appeals to the child's senses. Prepare such foods like finger foods, or foods that crunch or crackle when they eat it, foods that are different in texture and flavor. Foods that are too hot or too cold may also be rejected. As a parent it important to help children understand they are "good kids" to try to promote a positive attitude toward good food choices. Sometimes children may do things that are unacceptable, but who and what they are inside are normal, healthy and okay kids. http://www.nncc.org/nutrition/nutritian.pres.html

3. Every child's development is unique and complex. Each child develops through commonly predictable series of steps and milestones. Though they may not go through these milestones and steps at the same rate or the same way, don't expect your child to be just like other children. There is no one like your child.

At 4 years old children are developing a greater self-control and ingenuity. 4 year olds pretend play is more entailed and imaginative and sustained by longer periods. A child at this stage can make plans and complete tasks and want to try new experiences. The child also wants to be a more independent decision maker and expand the areas of their lives. At this stage of development a 4 year olds is quickly expanding their language skills and are able to communicate in complex and compound sentences. They are also capable of long periods of active play and exercise as well as skillful walking, climbing, jumping, hopping, skipping, marching, and galloping. They also look at the world with great curiosity and use imagination to help them understand it. 4 year olds also continue to learn the causes of feelings and realize others may react to situations in different ways. Children at this stage can also identify changes in pitch, tempo, loudness and musical duration, they can sing songs they make up and memorize songs they hear. They also love to dance and move with the rhythm smoothly. They are highly imaginative and their play has structure of specific scenarios, such as going to the grocery store, or saving a kitten in a tree. When my son was this age or younger he would play house. My son played like he was daddy and would get pretend cups for coffee, get dressed for work, and pack lunch to take with him. http://Pbs.org/parents/childdevelopment/tracker/four/index.html

4. The preoperational stage occurs between the ages of 2 and 6. The signs of this stage include language development. Plaget noted that children in this stage aren't able to understand concrete logic they are not yet able to "mentally manipulate information and are unable to take the point of view of others which he termed egocentrism". Plaget used creative and clever methods to study the mental ability of children using a picture of a mountain scene. He would ask the children to pick a picture that represented what they had seen. Most of the children were able to do this without difficulty. He would then ask the children to pick a picture showing what someone else would see from their point of view. In this experiment most children would pick the picture which they saw in their own point of view. Plaget discovered that the children had difficulty doing this because they were not able to take on someone else's perspective. http://psychology.about.com/ad/plagetstheory/p/preoperational.html

5. Psychologist Lev Vygotsky believed that children learn by interaction with the surrounding culture. The theory known as socio-cultural perspective, which states the cognitive development of children is heightened when they are in their zone of proximal development (ZDP). For a child to reach the ZDP they need help from adults or a person that is more competent than they are. Children need support or "scaffolding" when they are