Physical, Cognitive, and Social Development - Case Study Example

A Lifespan Paper on Physical, Cognitive, and Social Development of a 26-month-old Girl Name Institution This paper investigates the physical, cognitive, and social development of a female child aged 26 months. Being a unique stage of development, when the child shows distinctive physical, cognitive, and social development makes it worth exploring lifespan changes. The analysis is based on responses from an interview with the mother, Laura. ________________________________ Subject Name: Jane Age: 26 months ________________________________ Physical Development Jane is presently 26 months old. Her mother says she is growing at 3 to 5 inches per years. Currently, Jane is 36 inches tall. She weighs 32 pounds. Her body temperature and heart rate are normal. She gains 1 kilogram per year. Her weight is nearly 3 times her birth weight. He mother says that during a past clinic visit 2 weeks back, a health practitioner attending to her daughter commented that Jane’s respiration rate tend to vary with her physical activities and emotional state. She has 16 baby teeth. Jane’s head size, as her mother comments, seems to have grown by nearly 1 centimeter during the past half a year. These physical developments are consistent with physical development in two-year-olds as Brotherson (2006) comments. Therefore, Jane is on the right growth path, consistent with the developmental milestones. Jane’s mother does add that Jane’s chest circumference appears to be larger than the circumference of her head. What however, seems to worry Jane’s mother is that her daughter has legs that still seem bowed and often insists that her daughter should bask in the sun to strengthen her bones. What this shows is that Jane’s bones are still maturing and continue to go through a phase known as ossification, as Cook (2013) points out. It is clear that he hands are more active than her feet, which shows she follows the normal cephalocaudual and proximodistal development patterns (Law et al, 2014). Jane is also said to be losing baby fat with her physical activities, including walking. However, she is glad that Jane’s body shape has begun changing is assuming an adult-like appearance, despite the fact that the top still seems to be heavier, as he abdomen is protruded. It is clear that Jane’s physical development is normal. In the physical sense, when a child approaches the age of three, her height doubles while her weight quadruples. At the same time, the proportions of the body change, where the baby whose head accounts for nearly a fourth of the total length of her body appears to be a child with a better balanced yet adult-like look (Law et al, 2014). In the face of these fast physical changes, Jane is fast mastering a range of skills, such as walking, sitting, and using the toilet on her own. She can use a spoon to eat by herself. She can as well scribble. It is also that Jane appears to have adequate hand-eye coordination as she can throw and catch a ball. Jane’s mother also says that Jane has a number of bruises. The cases of bruises are surprising, as bruises tend to be common in two-year olds particularly when they approach pre‐school age. During this age, a child frequently tumbles on objects while attempting to walk and may have accidents since they are developing their gross motor skills and determined to explore the their environment.  Nevertheless, Jane’s mother says that the bruises do have patterns, which is normally typical of the two-year olds, on certain sections of her body such as the knee, face and arms as these are the sections a toddler her to knock she falls. While the bruises are typical signs of growth indicating that the child is physically active, it may also be concern when they are too frequent as it indicates that the children in pre‐school age has not been kept safe or effectively supervised. It is therefore surprising that Jane’s mother has no sense of curiosity regarding the manner in which the bruises are occurring as well as how the child has been kept safely supervised.   At any rate, a prevailing assumption from an assessment by a health practitioner two weeks back show that the bruises are linked to her being a lively kid. The bruises are, as Jane’s mother insists, compatible to the pattern of the child being hyperactive. This is particularly encouraging as Jane appears to have assumed a normal growth months after birth. As learnt from Jane’s mother, Jane was born prematurely and had associated complex health concerns, which implied that that feeding and caring her was difficult compared to healthy baby who has been born at term. Additional concerns existed regarding her care from birth, which persisted for sometimes.  Jane’s mother says that she was continually prompted to feed her. Between the ages of 6 months and 12 months, Jane’s lack of weight gain in addition to her poor emotional development was continually assessed and concluded to be a non-organic failure that had a potential to persist. At this rate, she was made to be a subject of a child protection plan.   During that age, her failure to gain weight was holistically assessed within the her emotional need feel attached to her mother in addition to her physical requirements for proper feeding and care. However, effective care followed, which eliminated the evidence of impaired development, which were noticeable during the initial months. Indeed, at age 2, Jane can walk alone and can run, although she continuously bumps into objects and stops whenever necessary. According to her mother, Jane is getting more confident presently with her physical abilities and has a good idea regarding ‘when to stop’. She loves to run usually in the opposite direction from her mother and minor falls are commonplace. The practitioner remarked that Jane is progressing effectively. Again, she has attended all her immunizations and checkups and her growth and motor skills have been adequately assessed. Regarding Jane’s eating habits, he mother comments that they are variable and varies on a daily basis. For instance, whenever she engages in hefty physical activities such as running in the park of climbing stairs, she eats much for at least 6 times. However, most days when she idles around, she rejects food and eats a little. This is consistent with a two-year-olds appetite as they undergo varied eating periods. In fact, it can be concluded that Jane has extraordinary stamina for a child who was born pre-term. She can maintain motor activity, can climb and descend the stairs one foot at a time and is just beginning to pedals her tricycle. These features demonstrate that her gross motor skills and fine motor skills are normal and consistent with the average skills a two-year-old toddler. Despite her outstanding abilities to run and even jump, she has problems buttoning her shirt or tying her shoe laces. These show that her early motor skills are proper an in accordance to where they are supposed to be for a two-year-old. According to Jane’s mother, since she was worried that Jane was born pre-term, and could face problems with physical growth, she had to invest in an appropriate outdoor and indoor environment that could motivate Jane as well as be inviting to all children. These encouraged Jane to explore all the prospects provided to her, including adventure, fun, creativity and challenge. Apparently, Jane’s mother believed in the significance of active learning and first-hand experiences. Since she valued the significance of play, she made sure Jane had ample materials that could to stimulate her imaginations. Indeed, providing a child with a supportive environment encourages rapid physical development. In her view, the environment was often welcoming, safe, spacious, clean, warm, as well as has fresh air. Indeed, while the outdoor play space is crucial as it allows a child to have a balanced growth, both mentally and physically, the development may be constrained when the children has to sit for elongated hours indoors. An environment should allow children to be able to actively explore, engage in personal decision-making, play, dance, move, and explore her motor skills. As Brotherson (2006) comment, children physical growth and development responds to the reality they are witnessing in their environment. Brotherson (2006) add that toddlers require a room or outside environment where they are allowed to relate their physical abilities with the environment. Cognitive Development According to Jane’s mother, Jane can search for objects that have been hidden under the cushion or bed sheet. She has also started to sort objects based on colour and shapes. She has also started to make-believe play and can pick, shape as well as put objects into her mouth. In fact, Jane has started to learn how to use spoon and drink using a cup. She also has a richer vocabulary, or words averaging 40 or 50. These show that Jane exhibits fair statistical learning through neural networks. According to Brandon et al. (2011), conception of statistical learning through neural networks is concerned with auditory and visual learning. His study on auditory and visual learning showed that the neural sensory statistical learning after birth is an important component of cognitive development. Jane’s ability to categorise objects based on colour and shapes shows that her brain is learning the statistical structure from experiencing events. It has also started to build neural networks that embody this information using algorithms. This is further indicated by Jane’s ability to differentiate simple visual forms, such as circles, crosses, and cubes. Jane is learning about the features in diverse objects, hence learning correlational structure. According to Brandon et al (2011), humans tend to segregate the world in terms of categories and objects on a correlational basis. Brandon et al (2011) further comment that the brains or babies apply similar statistical learning mechanisms to what is displayed dynamically in their environments. Jane’s brain also appears to be equally skilled within the auditory domain. When it comes to language, Jane exhibits prototypical sound elements, including the frequent occurrence of prototypical ‘B” and ‘P’ sound in her speech. Hence, her brain in registering the acoustic features consistently co-occurring, while the relative distributional frequencies give about phonetic categories such as ‘B” and ‘P’. Jane is also quickly learning through imitation, which French (2007) describes as a vital form of learning that occurs from birth. Jane can imitate gestures such as tongue protrusion. She can also open her mouth widely when she watches an adult make similar gestures. According to her mother, at the age of 10 months, she had learnt how to manipulate objects like experimenter-built toys once she had watched others to the same. At the age of two, she can imitate intended actions even when her mother makes a mistake. Her mother explains that whenever she intended to slot in a string of beads in a can and accidentally missed, Jane could take the beads and slot them into the can successfully. This indicates that Jane attributes intentions to the actor. As Brandon et al (2011) explain, when babies understand other people’s goals, they are able to translate their bodily motions to become purposive behaviour. Jane’s mother comments that at present, her daughter demonstrates use of verbal representation, although her speech is still egocentric. She also uses symbolic communication through gestures instead of motor play. Jane also tends to learn by analogy. According to French (2007), learning by analogy involves observing similarities between situations. Jane’s ability to learn is demonstrated where, when her toys are placed out of their reach or behind box, while the toy has strings attached to the toy that lies on a cloth, to get the toy, Jane first removes the box, before pulling on the cloth to access the string and eventually to pull the string in order to access the toy. According to Jane’s mother, her daughter often used analogies when she was around 12 months. Jane demonstrates commendable vocabulary development. According to Goswami (2015), the function of language is for purposes of expression. Words also form a component of meaning-making experienced during the initial development. Brandon et al (2011) also comment that conceptual representations come first before eventual language development, which is based on the perceptual experience of events and objects. As in the case of Jane, her parents and carers talked to her before she eventually started to attempt to talk back. For instance, she named objects they attended to alongside her mother at the age of two. However, she first started to use gestures by pointing at objects and attempting to repeat what her mother attempted to say. This is consistent with what Goswami (2015) attempts to say. In his view, in child cognitive development, gesture comes before language production as it provides a ‘cognitive bridge’ between language generation and conception. At the age of two, Jane has vocabulary size of nearly 200 words, although her range of word production is still limited, and is within the range of 40 and 50 words. Such an achievement appears to be consistent with Piaget’s theoretical view that a symbolic comprehension of the ‘object concept’ created at similar time. Indeed, French (2007) comments that at the age of 2, new word learning is tremendously rapid, with some 10 new words that they acquire on a daily basis. Jane’s rapid learning is what Brandon et al (2011) calls ‘fast mapping.’ Jane has also demonstrated rapid grammatical development. She is acquiring a particular construction of grammatical forms based on what those around her say. At the age of two, she is acquiring ‘utterance’ that depicts a comparatively logical communicative intention. Goswami (2015) comments that when children show comparatively logical communicative intention, then it implies they are building on such piecemeal utterances through the application of similar pattern-finding mechanisms that support learning in different areas, including categorisation, analogy, and statistical learning. Still, it appears her mother has been reformulating Jane’s utterance as component of natural conversation instead of openly correcting it. At the age of two, Jane is also developing pretend play. According to Goswami (2015), pretending emerges when the child reaches age two, even as early pretence is essentially linked to the apparently proper actions they tend to make an objects. For instance, Jane’s mother comments that at the age of 12, her daughter could pretend to drink from an empty cup. Later when Jane has reached 2 years, her pretences had become more detached from such object identities, she pretends that a stock is a remote control. Therefore, it is conceivable that Jane exhibits more advanced pretending. In fact, her mother admits that Jane can at present imitating the pretence of others. At the age of two, Jane appears to have a clear understanding that she is a wholly separate person from her parents, carers, and siblings. French (2007) explains that this is the reason a child appears to be worried about the likelihood of his parents leaving her, hence causing the child to repeatedly use the terms like "mine" and "me". In fact, Jane’s mother appreciates that the terms "mine" and "me” have lately occurred frequently in her speech. Brandon et al (2011) explain that the idea of owning an object is means to adjusting to the sense of independence and identity. While Jane has started to understand common words in her family’s vocabulary such as ‘come,’ she still has a problem grasping abstract concepts, as she is a highly concrete thinker. She is also curious and highly energetic although this is contingent on her parents’ presence and frequency to reassure them. She also demands plenty of her parent’s attention as Jane’s mother says that she finds it difficult leaving for work, as Jane often cries. Social development According to Cooper et al (2009), children at the age of two know what they want and tend to be bossy and temperamental when stopped from doing something they believe is rights. Cooper et al (2009) explains that this is since the babies at this age are just learning to manage their feelings. For these reasons, they are likely to have temper tantrums. According to Mireault (2007), at the age of two, the child becomes highly attached to and contingent on parents and tend to be scared of separating from their parents as she does not yet have a full understanding that the parent will return. At any rate, Jane has started to have greater independence as she can play alone. According to her mother, Jane can often play alone with given her toys without caring of those around her for at least 3months. She has also become less distrustful of strangers, and allows them to carry her without crying or resisting. Jane’s mother says that it appears that Jane currently enjoys to be carried and to sit silently among the family, as though listening to every conversation. According to her mother, Jane likes adult attention and will often be excited when the parents are around. While Jane also enjoys the company of neighbouring children, she still does not play cooperatively. The sought of independence is also showed by her tendency to avoid cooperating with daily routines she once like. For instance, she resists bathing and dressing. She also refuses to eat and sometimes appears motivated to trying doing them on her own accord. Jane’s mother is, however, intensely worried about her daughter’s temper tantrums, and has considered seeking an intervention from the doctor. She says that Jane often kicks about when being dressed, and may throw things about when she is not being given attention. She may also cry intensely when hungry. Nonetheless, the temper tantrums are absolutely normal and are consistent with current scholarly findings. Reebye (2005) comments that temper tantrum at the age of two are universally accepted phenomenon. In his review, Reebye (2005) concluded that young toddlers tended to be aggressive and reactive. Some scholars like Dosman and Andrews (2012) have also agreed that the expression of aggression is linked to poor emotional or self-regulation, since the capacity to self- regulate becomes modulated during the initial 30 months after a baby is born. Jane’s situation is however, not a concern as it does not indicated an aggressive behaviour. According to Reebye (2005), the tantrums cannot be categorised under aggressive behaviour, which is a social disorder, as it is characterised by lack of intent to harm or hurt. Still, Jane’s tantrums present an emotional crisis in her social development. According to Mireault and Trahan (2007), the temper tantrums depict a momentary emotional crisis for toddlers, which is her response when she is not able to regulate her emotional impulses. Dosman and Andrews (2012) comment that tantrums originate when a child becomes frustrated with her verbal expressions. This may be true for Jane. Indeed, Jane’s mother admits that her daughter is more prone tantrums whenever she gets fatigued, distressed, or whenever she senses a deviation from the normal routine of doing things. References Brandon, M., Sidebotham, P., Ellis, C., Baley, S. & Belderson, P. (2011). Child and family practitioners’ understanding of child development: Lessons learnt from a small sample of serious case reviews. East Anglia: University of East Anglia Brotherson, S. (2006). Understanding Physical Development in Young Children. Bright Beginning. Retrieved from: Cook, K. (2013). Physical Activity and Physical Education: Relationship to Growth, Development, and Health. Retrieved from: Cooper, J., Masi, R. & Vick, J. (2009). Social-emotional Development in Early Childhood What Every Policymaker Should Know. Colombia: National Center for Children in Poverty Dosman, C. & Andrews, D. (2012). Anticipatory guidance for cognitive and social-emotional development: Birth to five years. Paediatr Child Health, 17(2), 75–80 French, G. (2007). Children’s early learning and development: A research paper. Dublin: National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) Goswami, U. (2015). Children’s Cognitive Development And Learning. Research Reports Cambridge Primary Review Trust Research Survey 3, Law, J., Shaw, P., Earland, M. & Lee, M. (2014). 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