Perspective in Children Development - Essay Example

PERSPECTIVE IN CHILDREN DEVELOPMENT In the recent past, there have been increasing sociological and anthropological interest in studying childhood. This study was inspired by James and Prout and has developed to be an area of interest for many people. This study has been promoted by the seemingly different values and roles that have been employed in rearing of children in different societies. Cross cultural understanding of childhood has been seen as one of the most important tools that can help in development of multicultural understandings. There is need to understand childhood development in different society despite the increasing economic, cultural and educational pressure that have a direct effect on childhood. In a historical and biological perspective, motherhood has played a crucial role in mapping of childhood. It is normal for mothers to turn hostile in a bid to protect their loved ones. It is argued that the discovery of motherhood in the recent past has done greatly to improve the life of children and has also contributed greatly to the end of the stealing of children as was witnessed in some societies in the last centuries. Child development refers to growth aspects of children which can be in aspects of biological and physiological. There are many factors that denote this development primarily being evidenced in increasing autonomy of children. Childhood development is witnessed in various stages of growth from newborn to infants to toddler to preschool to school aged and it is concluded by adolescent stage. Childhood development is marked in different milestones which can be defined as specific physical and mental abilities which correspond to various stages of development. (Hixson, 2004) Childhood development id expressed in development milestones which appears in the first five years of life. Childhood development is represented in some perspectives which are used as marks of the milestone. These include physical development, social and emotional development, thinking skills and communication skills. These perspectives are the ones which are used to gauge the level of development of a child from childhood. It is to be understood that these are used as markers or indicators of growth for children as expressed in different growth milestones. In a real growth, development in one area overlaps the development in another area but generally this development works to reinforce a development in another area and at the same time it is reinforced by development in another area. Let us look closely at these developments. (Dunst and Kassow, 2004) Physical development is represented in growth in the physical body like gain in height with. This is perhaps one of the most important makers of growth in children and is often used by many mothers to assess children hood development. Some of development in physical development included raising head slightly when lying on stomach, hold hand in a fist, lift head and chest, grasping, crawling, walking, standing and others. Social and emotional developments are hard to point than other aspects of growth in physical development. Social and emotional development is laid more on skills that increase self-awareness and self-regulation. There is evidence that social skills and emotional development are important makers of readiness for school. They are usually reflected in the ability of the child to pay attention, make transitions, and cooperate with others. Social development is marked in the way a child relates with others. This is the long process of self awareness and may continue for long time till adolescent stage. (James and Prout, 1997) Before there were studies on the thinking or cognitive skills of children, they were once thought to be passive and unknowing. However it has been proved that children are active learner and they develop in their cognitive ability. Children are actively involved in gathering information. These skills help in to progress in development of perceptual and thinking skills. Some to these developments include vision, distinguishing between tastes, distinguishing color, distinguishing volume, responding to facial expressions and stimuli and many others. Communication skills refer to the development in the ability to express themselves clearly with othes. This involves the development speech, learning of different languages, and others. It has been proved that children are active language learners who use their cognitive development to understand a language. Some of the communication skills include responding speech, development of different language, communicate with body movements, and others. Childhood development is expressed in different growth theories which all present growth in particular dimensions as a construction and reconstruction process. The behavior analytical theory by Watson gave new insight on how childhood development is marked by changing behaviors. This theory brought about a natural science perspective in the growth of childhood. This theory was further extended by Skinner models of operant conditioning and verbal behavior. Skinner postulated that childhood development is determined by some particular aspects which conditions or shapes their behavior. Skinner focused more on how the environment shapes the behavior of children. He focused more on how environment shapes thinking and feeling of children. (Gerwtiz, 1992) The study on behavior development of children was boosted by Sidney Bijou and Donald Baer when they studied their behavior analytic principles in child development. They came up with four stage models of development in which all the stages are socially determined. The models represented factors like stimulating, behavior function and the learning history. The same study of the effect of behaviorism in development of the child is also expressed in the study by Rousseau who asserts that there is one developmental process which is common to all people. He referred it as an intrinsic natural process in which main behavior is manifested in form of curiosity. Rousseau asserted that children are born as designed organism which is ready to learn from the experience of their surroundings. This happening as the child grow to a virtuous adult but this is not achieved due to the corrupt society that we live in. in his assertion Rousseau advocated for an educational method which would remove children from the society and hence for the conditioning them to the environment. (Michael, 1990) As expressed in theories of development, construction and reconstruction can take place in different perspectives of development. In social cognition development, there is an effect in the later development of childhood which may result from early life. For example Psychic trauma may result when the ego is overcome by intolerable effect. In this regard we should see some childhood experiences which can be directly traumatic and which don't require an intervening interpretive process in order to render them traumatic. This may have an effect in the Child's psychic development. However, this is dependant on some factors likes meaning of that trauma or experience to the child. The psycho pathogenic effects of childhood experience can be counted as function of the child's general level of cognitive sophistication. Social cognition is important to help us understand when and how a lived experience ends affecting the development of the child. But it is always that this effect will be everlasting in the mind of the child and there is likelihood that there will be a reconstruction effect later in life of the child. It has been shown that it is possible to reconstruct this traumatic effect on the mind of the child in later life. Childhood development can be viewed in a larger way as a construction and reconstruct. There is more emphasize on the need to invest a lot in the early years of childhood development since this would go along way in assisting to develop evenly the children in their later development. These perspectives show that failure to invest in children in their early life can have a far reaching effect in the cost of the society. It has been shown that children who grow in an environment where their needs are not fully met have serious developmental problems later in life. The growth of children can be seen as natural in a larger extent. Review of the above shows that children are born with some natural ability to develop in line with their environment. Theories of developments asserts that children the environment has a lot of effect in the way childhood development takes place in line with their genetic make up. From the time they are born, infant are helpless in this uncertain world and they depend on their parents for support. The model of attachment recognizes that this role of uncertainty and that infant are somehow limited to in terms of their communicating needs. Children are born with a natural urge to socialization. The socialization processes is initiated by teachers and continue later in life. This is determined by the social skills that children adopt in their early life. (Burman, 1994) Thus we can say that childhood development is a natural process that uses the influence of the environment to construct and reconstruct different aspects of child behavior. These influences affect education and general life of the child. References Burman, E. (1994). Deconstructing Development Psychology. London: Routledge Dunst, J. & Kassow, Z. (2004). Parental Sensitivity to Child Behavior. New York: Wiley Gerwtiz, L. (1992). B.F. Skinner's Infant Behavior Development. American Psychologist, Vol. 3(4): 12-56 Greenwolld, W. (2003). Communication Indicators for Infants. The Behavior Analyst, Vol. 3(1): 4-8 Hixson, D. (2004). Complete Science of Behavior Development. Behavior Analyst, Vol. 5(4): 4-7 James, A. & Prout, A. (1997). Constructing and Reconstruction childhood. London: Falmer Press. Michael, R. (1990). Straight and Devious Pathways from Childhood to Adulthood. Cambridge University Press Timimi, S. (2004). Childhood Depression Retrieved from, http://www.critpsynet.freeuk.com/childdepression.htm on 4th March 2008 Read More