CHFD342 Week 4 Notes

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Jan 9, 2024

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CHFD342 | LESSON 4 Physical, Cognitive, and Psychosocial Development of Children in Middle Age Years Topics to be covered include:  Physical development of children in middle age years  Cognitive development of children in middle age years  Moral development of children in middle age years  Language development of children in middle age years  Influences on children’s self-esteem Introduction The middle childhood stage of development occurs from ages nine through 11. This age is defined by the emergence of many talents and abilities that have been developing since infancy and early childhood. It is also a period of cognitive complexities and moral reasoning. Having an inquiring mind, supportive environment, a willingness to look at multiple solutions, determination and an acceptance of risk can lead to amazing success at this age. Understanding development during this period is critical because we need to continue a significant shift in how we educate children at this age. We live in a highly developing technological world that requires critical thinking, problem solving, innovation, and a willingness to change and evolve. Adults must work hard to develop children in this stage but at the same account for their fragile developmental needs as well. Physical Development in Middle Age Children Physical development at this stage is much slower than infancy and early childhood. Children grow on average two inches and two pounds per year. During this time, children are very, very active. The body size catches up to the head size and their frame begins to look more like an adult during this period. Brain Development One of the biggest changes during this time is brain development. As we have discussed earlier, memory involves the use of the whole brain. There are specific regions in the brain linked to motor skill, language skill, understanding language, visual, and auditory processing. Since children during the middle age period of development are so active and curious, it is vital that parents and teachers understand how to maximize learning through taking advantage of brain development. In Lesson 3, we discussed that the greatest potential for mastering the most number

of concepts was during early childhood because of the incredible explosion of neurons during this time. 1/4 At the middle childhood stage, growth has slowed somewhat but the process for learning new concepts is the same and will continue to be the same during adolescence and adulthood. Because of this slowing ability for the brain to learn new concepts, it is critical that teachers and parents understand that the best way to accelerate learning is twofold: first to be very intentional about how to create new neural pathways in the brain and second to teach children to make connections to existing pathways of information and memories. These connections are how children at this age (and future ages) learn best. 2/4 As we discussed, the brain continues to form neural pathways through the process of myelination. The more a concept or memory is used the more myelin the brain supplies to the pathway, thereby strengthening that pathway. A great way to think about this is to imagine a grassy area where kids cut through on the way to school. As the kids pass through the same area, a path begins to occur with the grass being knocked down in the same area. Eventually, that path becomes so common that the city decides to put in a sidewalk to create a solid pathway. This is the same way that our brain works. As children begin to learn new concepts or ideas, they begin to create a grassy path. As they use that same knowledge and engage in activities where they practice the same concept through repetition, the brain reinforces the pathway with myelin. It eventually creates a sidewalk, which is much stronger. Remember, the stronger the neural pathway, the quicker a person can retrieve and apply that information. This has a strong application for teaching at this age. 3/4 Marzano (2004) has used neuroscience as a foundation to suggest that children need 21 to 49 (depends on the child) non-mundane repetitions to learn a new concept (to create a solid pathway). Non-mundane simply means that the child must be involved in a learning activity that mentally engages them. On the other hand, if that sidewalk is left unused and unattended, it eventually will crack and lose its strength. The same happens in the brain’s neural pathways. If a pathway goes unused, it begins to prune away. 4/4 Keene and Zimmerman (1997) were some of the first researchers to cite the importance of making connections to prior knowledge, concepts and memories as techniques for learning. Since children and adults have these existing neural pathways and they are limited in creating only so many new pathways at a time; the best way to learn new concepts is to connect new information and concepts to existing ones. This allows the brain to make connections between neural pathways. Visually, you can think of this as a superhighway rather than simple sidewalks. This has led to profound changes in teaching strategies. It is critical for teachers to intentionally force children to make connections at this age.

Nutrition Proper nutrition is very important at this age of development. Children are expending a lot of energy and have growing motor skills. It is important to establish good eating habits. As schedules get busy and children start being influenced by peers, maintaining good nutrition is imperative. During this time, children’s bodies are beginning to prepare for substantial growth in adolescence. Unfortunately, poor eating habits can lead to the beginning stages of obesity. Over the last twenty years, overweight children in America have increased almost 300 percent. Obesity leads to variety of social, psychological, and medical consequences. There are a many variables such as genetic influences, health and nutrition that cause fluctuations in the growth of children. Children will achieve major milestones during this time but development differs between cultures and ethnic groups. Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood Years We will again return to Piaget’s theory of cognitive development. Piaget defines this age period as being the concrete operational period. At this period, children begin to employ logical thought processes with concrete items. He highlights several accomplishments in this period. As you read these, keep in mind limitations we discussed during the pre-operational period from Lesson 3. The accomplishments include: Decentering Decentering is a process by which a child can concentrate on more than one topic at a time. Conservation Conservation is the understanding that objects retain certain properties no matter how its form changes (remember the glasses of water with the same volume but different shapes). Seriation Seriation is where a child can arrange items in increasing or decreasing size. Classification Classification is where children can group objects with some similarities within a larger category (like grouping basketballs, then baseballs, etc.)

Reversibility Reversibility is the process where a child can retrace his or her thoughts. Numeration Numeration is the process where a child can grasp the concept of a number and one to one. New Approaches of Explaining Child Development Piaget provided a great contribution to our understanding about cognitive development in children. He forced the research field to reconsider how children learn and he taught us that children are active rather than passive participants when creating their mental worlds. As a result, his work has been used as a foundation for new theories, and many new and creative ways of looking at cognitive development have emerged. Howard Gardner (1983) released his theory of multiple intelligences in the early 1980s. This theory completely changed the way development researchers and practitioners thought about cognitive development. Gardner theorized that there are eight different types of intelligences. He further stated that children lean towards some of the intelligences more than others and that these intelligences are linked to certain aspects of the brain. These eight intelligences include: Linguistic Language development Musical Early appearance of natural musical ability is linked to the right hemisphere Logical-Mathematical Natural ability to think abstractly, solve problems, etc. Spatial Ability to visualize

Bodily – Kinesthetic Control of body. Interpersonal The ability to understand and interact with others as well as have a great sensitivity to what others are feeling. Intrapersonal An awareness and understanding of one’s own feelings (both are linked to frontal lobe). Naturalistic Ability to discriminate among living things, being very sensitive to the world around us. The application of this theory for parents and teachers is to understand each (child) student’s strengths relative to these intelligences and then to lean on those strengths. Sternberg (1988) provided a theory of intelligences as well. The triarchic theory of intelligence is based on a broader definition of intelligence than is typically used. In this theory, intelligence is defined in terms of the ability to achieve success in life based on one's personal standards–and within one's sociocultural context. The ability to achieve success depends on the ability to capitalize on one's strengths and to correct or compensate for one's weaknesses. Success is attained through a balance of analytical, creative, and practical abilities–a balance that is achieved in order to adapt to, shape, and select environments. Problem Solving and Thinking Skills As discussed in earlier lessons, the world children exist in today is much different than the world we grew up in. New and rapidly changing technology requires people that can think critically and solve problems. Critical thinkers are self-correcting, discover their own weaknesses and act to remove obstacles and address faults. There have been several theories that have moved learning in this area forward over the years. Bloom’s Taxonomy provides an important framework for parents and teachers to use to focus on higher order thinking. By providing a hierarchy of levels, this taxonomy can assist teachers in designing performance tasks, crafting questions for conferring with students, and providing feedback on student work. This resource is divided into different levels each with keywords that exemplify the level and questions that focus on that same critical thinking level. Questions for critical thinking can be used in the classroom to develop all levels of thinking within the

cognitive domain. The results will be improved attention to detail, increased comprehension and expanded problem solving skills. Parents and teachers should use the keywords as guides to structure questions and tasks. The six levels are: Create This is the ability to produce new or original work. Evaluate This is the ability to justify a stand or decision. Analyze This is the ability to form raw connections among ideas. Apply This is the ability to use information in new situations. Understand This is the ability to explain ideas or concepts. Remember This is the ability to recall facts and basic concepts. Problem Solving Problem solving is a critical skill for children to master during the middle childhood years. A problem exists when someone has a goal in mind and there are obstacles involved. There are four parts to a problem: goals, obstacles, strategies for overcoming obstacles, and an evaluation of results. During middle childhood years, children progress in many cognitive areas that assist them with problem solving. Their memory improves, short-term memory increases, ability to acquire and use strategies for memory increase, speed in processing information increases and their general knowledge expands.

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