Using Eriksons Theory of Psychosocial Development - Essay Example

Preschoolers At this stage of life a child’s life, parents need to support their child in initiating activities and making up games in order to make him/her confident and creative. According to Erikson, if parents criticize or over-control their children at this stage of life, the children will develop a sense of guilt and will find it difficult to take correct decisions (Cherry).School Age School age is the most critical stage of a child’s life because they start learning the ways to interact with other people.

At this stage, parents need to encourage and reinforce their child’s initiatives in order to make him/her industrious and confident. According to Erikson, lack of encouragement at this stage of life can make the child feel inferior to others (Cherry).Adolescents According to Erikson, a child starts to become more independent and social during adolescence (Cherry). Therefore, parents need to make the child aware of all positive and negative aspects of everything. They should support their child’s decisions regarding his/her educational and professional careers.

Using Piaget’s Cognitive Developmental Theory Piaget focused more on the intellectual development of a child and transitions of childhood and youth. Piaget mentioned in his theory that children construct cognitive worlds on their own by going through four essential stages of understanding the world. As Favilla states, “cognitive theory concerns itself with the way children and adolescents process information” (Favilla). Piaget believed that the cognitive development of a child occurs in stages.

Those stages include the sensorimotor stage, the preoperational stage, the concrete operational stage, and the formal operational stage.The Sensorimotor StageAt the sensorimotor stage of a child’s life (infants and toddlers), parents should help the child construct an understanding of the world by developing a link between sensory experiences and physical actions.The Preoperational StageAt the preoperational stage of a child’s life (preschool age), parents should help children understand the world using drawings and words.

The Concrete Operational StageAt the concrete operational stage of a child’s life (school age), parents should help children perform different activities physically. It will help children replace intuitive thoughts with logical reasoning.The Formal Operational StageAt the formal operational stage of a child’s life (adolescence), parents should make children aware of different aspects of life. Parents should provide a creative environment to their children in order to help them refine their logical reasoning and critical thinking skills.