Early Childhood Development - Term Paper Example

 Personal View on Early Childhood Development Introduction Urie Bronfenbrenner (1917-2005) constructed the ecological systems theory to analyze the factors which affect a child and how the effects of the environment in he is surrounded affects him. He divided the environment into different levels. The different levels of an environment which influence the development of a child are 1. Micro-system 2. Mesosystem 3. Exosystem 4. Macrosystem In the first 36 months of a child’s life, a child’s thinking and behavior patterns are established as the brain connections multiply and form the motor that activate a child’s thinking for the rest of his life. These early ages are the most critical in the development of a child. The parents or guardians of children should take extra care of the nutritional needs, learning and emotional protection of the children. When the children grow up a bit, it is the responsibility of the children to detect any changes in the child’s behavior as it would be easier for them to detect any difference in behavior in a class with many children. Early childhood is a precious time – a true window of opportunity – that cannot be re-opened later on. Early childhood care and development leads to the formation of a healthy society because of the children are well cared of they are most likely to become responsible citizens and human beings. The Micro-system The micro-system denotes the lowest level of environment. It is the immediate environment the child adopts as he is surrounded by it from the start. When a child is in a micro-system he develops the sense of differentiating similar faces from dissimilar face. Most of the development of the child occurs in this phase of life. The micro-system of children includes people who spend more time with them, play with them and take care of them. These people can be family members the child sees everyday for example mother, father, grandparents and siblings. It also contains caregivers at home, or teachers at day cares. The behavior which the child sees from these people, he will try to adopt that behavior naturally. It will have an effect on the growth of the child. If the mother of the child is patient and calm, the child would tend to be polite and less aggressive then the children whose mothers are short tempered. In the same way if the child is hand over to teachers at daycare who use bad language the child will be tempted to learn those words and will eventually learn them. If the care takers at home do not take care of their hygiene the child would learn to be like them since he would see a friend and mentor in them as a child at that level does not know the difference between right and wrong. It is the responsibility of the parents specifically, to correct their own selves first in order to represent themselves as the role models to the children. At this level all relationships are meaningful to the child. The child would know how loves him more and how gets angry on the things he does. Children are intelligent enough to grasp languages at a faster rate at this level. Therefore, it should be made sure that children are not subjected to abusive language at such early ages. Every person has a temperament and like everyone children also have a temperament which shows in a child’s personality trait. Personality traits are inherited genetically and biologically. As a person grows, he takes control of his personality. The more encouraging and nurturing care is provided to the child, the better the child will be able to grow in mentally and physically. “The period of early childhood should be given the top most priority especially if responsible governments make decisions about laws, policies, programs and money. Even then unfortunately for the children, the society and for the nation, these years receive the least attention.” – State of the World’s Children, 2001- The Mesosystem The next system which occurs in the early development of a child is the Mesosystem. The Mesosystem is a connection of the different people working together in the micro-system. Their efforts are gathered and reflected through the behavior of the child. The caregivers for example a mothers are the prime actors in the Mesosystem. If they take part in extra-curricular activities with the child, the child will develop different skills in him. If the child is isolated and he sees his friends’ parents taking part in parent teacher meetings and other school activities, he would feel depressed and his mental status tends to get disturbed. Parents with complicated marital status should not let the effects of their personal life affect their children. Hence, mothers along with step fathers and fathers along with step mothers should not teach different lessons to the child as he would lose his confidence in the people he looks up to as his role models. Children of divorced parents are found to have a split life and such children lack family values and are seen to be malnourished. These children start to hate their parents for leaving them in isolation. They tend to be jealous and sensitive when they see families at parks and picnics. They grow up to be confused beings whereas some get aggressive and get involved in illegal activities. The families who have issues among them should not allow their children to suffer due to their personal issues. Divorced parents should actively take part in their child’s school activities and make him feel that he is loved. Grandparents can support such children and take them out to the park in the evening so that such children do maintain their social life otherwise their mental status will be disturbed and it will continue to grow with age. Such children when they grow up tend to be violent and attention seekers. A few other factors which are included in the Mesosystem are community, religion, school, society and culture. These factors also affect the exo-system. The Exosystem The Exosystem does not directly relate to a child but it indirectly affects the child. The Exosystem includes the parents’ workplace, neighborhood and extended family members. Parents’ workplace can have positive and negative impacts on the child. For example if the child’s parent gets a promotion he/she would be able to buy more things for the house and for the child which would leave a positive impact on the child about his parent’s workplace. In the same way if the child’s parent is fired and the parent is sent home and ends up to be jobless, he/she would not be able to spend money openly, leaving a negative impact on the child about his parent’s workplace. After school, a child spends most of his time in the neighborhood with friends if he has friends or is found alone playing with his toys or exploring new things. The type of neighbors a person has also plays an important role in the early childhood development. For example if a child has aged neighbors and he sees his parents taking care of them by providing them food and by looking after their needs than the child will also adopt the same nature from his parents. If the aged neighbors are nice, they would love and caress the child in the absence of his parents. This would develop love and affection by the child for his neighbors. If a person has neighbors who are involved in illegal activities and the child happens to witness them, it would develop curiosity in him to find out what his neighbors are involved in and why they always get in trouble as the police officers are often seen outside their house. This would develop fear in the child for those neighbors. It is the parents and teachers responsibility to warn their children/students against such people and should guide them not to talk to them, or accept invitations to go to their house or any presents and should be told over and over again not to disclose any personal information about their family or house with strangers. Extended family members include the joint family members living together or relatives who visit every now and then. The more the child interacts with different types of people, the more he will learn from their experiences and from their way of living. The family members preferred for developing behavior patterns in children are grandparents. As it is they are lonely half the time so by spending time with their grandchildren they can keep themselves busy. As grandparents are of a valued aged, they have gained a tremendous amount of experience from their life. Grandparents should share those experiences with the children, not only children but any child as development for all children is important for the society. They can tell the children stories which would increase their imagination and they would ask questions and discuss things with them. This way, children from a very young age will realize the importance of family and relations. Family members who do not live in the same house should be invited for gathering at least once a month so that the child learns the value of family gatherings in order for him to respect those relations when he grows up and he would develop a sense of security by seeing his relatives around him. The Macrosystem The Macro-system includes the customs, culture, religion, beliefs and laws of the culture which are introduced to the child eventually as he grows up and his understanding towards things increases. Through the macro-system a child learns about culture, customs, religious duties, beliefs and laws from his parents, teachers and friends whose families follow different religion, customs and culture. The children should be taught to respect all religions, cultures and customs even if they do not follow them. The macro-system influences the ways how parents, teachers and others should raise a child. The macro-system influences the interactions of all other layers. It influences the exosystem when the government announces splitting of the neighborhood into zones which would mean distance of the child from his favorite neighbors and shifting to a new school available in the zone of his house. This will cause difficulties for the child as he would have to make new friends all over again and would have to develop understanding with the new teachers. The macro-system affects the Mesosystem in a similar way. For example, if a child of Asian descent sees his parents and family to be hard working and he is raised in the same way to believe that determination and hard work would make him a successful person he would accept the idea enthusiastically. The macro-system also influences the effects of the micro-system. Different cultures have different believes. For example Americans have an open minded and free lifestyle whereas Asians are family oriented. So a child from an Asian family would have close relationships with his family, learning from their experiences to be hard working and patient. Conclusion Children at early ages are like wet clay. They can be molded into any shape the molder wishes to but if he takes too long, the clay hardens and sets. If the shape is tried to change once it has set, it will either break or distort and would be wasted. The same is the case with children in their initial stages of life. During the early years of life, their brain cells work the fastest; hence they are ready to accept new information readily. Children need special attention from parents especially the mothers because they can understand the child more than anyone else. Teachers play an equally important role because most of learning phase occurs during school time with the teachers around them. In order for elders to be role models for the children they should first correct themselves so that they do not leave a bad impact on the youth of tomorrow. Urie Bronfenbrenner quotes: “In today's world parents have pressurized themselves under so much work that they do not find time to take part in the developmental activities of their children. This prevents the parent to be a friend, guider and companion to the child instead he is left as a machine.” Reference Edwards, P., & Young, L. (1992) Beyond parents: Family, community, and school involvement. Phi Delta Kappan, 74, 72-80. Oswalt, A. (Updated: Jan 17th 2008) “Urie Bronfenbrenner and Child Development” from http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=7930 Rowley, J. (1999). The good mentor. Educational Leadership, 56, 20-22. (Urie Bronfenbrenner (b. 1917) U.S. (Russian-born) psychologist, advocate for families. Two Worlds of Childhood: U.S. and U.S.S.R., preface (1973).) Word Count= 2,036 Read More