Cephalocaudal Principle Of Child Observation

Sara Smilansky is a Developmental Theorist who has identified four types of play: Functional play, Constructive play, Dramatic play, and games with rules. Smilansky says that Dramatic play is the most mature type of play because this is the time where children start to understand their surroundings and imitate what

The methods used to collect data for this focus study include both five observations of the focus child during play and notes from an informal conversation with the focus child’s mother. These methods were used in conjunction with one another as they compliment each other within research. This is because a particular strength of observations lies in the researcher being able to clearly see and identify what the child is doing instead of gaining this information from the child or parent which could be open to interpretation or other modifiers (McDevitt, Ellis Ormrod, Cupid, Chandler, & Aloa, 2013). Utilising the informal conversation in conjunction with the observations ensured that I could still obtain the mothers perspective on her child and was useful as a confirmation of my research question after my initial observations lead me to focus on the general area of C.W’s physical development and play. Deciding to only use anecdotal observations stemmed from McDevitt et al. (2013) that “the kind of observations we conduct depend on what we hope to gain from watching and listening to children” (50) and as the research focus question centres on helping to “identify individual needs” (51) much the same as anecdotal observations I decided they would be the most appropriate research method.

The stages of social play is a theory that is composed by Mildred Parten. In 1932, she conducted a study of children from ages of 2 to 4 years old. The goal of her experiment was to identify the interaction of children among peers and influences of play. There are 6 stages of social play behavior; unoccupied, onlooker, solitary independent, parallel activity, associative play, and cooperative organized play. All of these stages were represented in my observation of the toddlers play with one another. The first 3 behaviors of social play correlated to a child’s independence involved to social play among his or her peers. Those behaviors are unoccupied, onlooker, and solitary independence. First, the behavior of a child may not engage in

Preschool Observation Paper Jacqueline Larsen Brooklyn College Abstract This paper contains observations of a preschool classroom in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The observation was conducted in a Pre-K classroom with approximately ten students present. Observations are presented with regard to dramatic play, the presence of gender roles, and themes that emerge during preschool play. Peer relationships and levels of friendship between students will also be discussed. Relationships with adults in the classroom with in terms of attachment styles and general interactions involving teachers and parents will be reviewed. Observations are also described in relation to self-control, self-regulation, aggression,

Cooperative play - Cooperative play occurs in the later preschool years. Children are able to take on roles and sustain them for the duration of the play. The group of children have agreed upon goals and roles for the play. In this stage of play, leaders and followers emerge within groups. Roles are delegated and tasks distributed within the group. There is a common goal and children will play together in a more complex

In the toddler classroom, the children interacted with each other, however many of them were more interested in playing and exploring on their own. The children enjoyed free play at learning centers, story time, and outside play during my observation. The toddlers preferred parallel play in which the children used similar toys in similar ways, but did not interact with each other. For example, when one child began playing with the kitchen toys in the dramatic play center, soon all of the children began playing with the available plastic food items. However, the children were more interested in showing the teachers what they were doing and

Observation # 2: Notes: It was 9:45am on Tuesday, October 20th, 2015: The children were taking part in an art activity. On the piece of paper, each child had a drawn out bubble lettered number one. They were given each given four popsicle sticks and a small pile of glue. The teacher instructed them to use the paint brush to spread the glue out inside the number one and then place the popsicle sticks on top.

It seemed like she liked playing with others more than just playing by herself. When the little boy came over to knock the blocks over she started laughing, because she thought it was so funny. Also, when she was in her crib after she got in trouble, and the child approached her again to play she quickly stopped crying and began to play with him. Even when she was walking with the walker she wanted someone to play with her and when she started “chasing” the other child with the walker she laughed again. This shows me that she is very social and plays well with

Introduction: In this case study I will describe the observation of a child while applying psychodynamic thinking and theory. The whole observation took place in a secondary school within a 9 week period, one hour every week. However, I was able to observe this particular child 6 times as at the beginning I was given a different child. Due to the fact that the first child was not attending the lessons they had to change him and find me a different one. For confidentiality reasons all the names that will be referred in this case study are going to be pseudonymous. The second child will be referred as Marissa, the Learning Support Assistant (LSA) as Anna, the Inclusion Manager as Alison and the school as Roots. In this observation the main purpose was to attempt to understand the unconscious inner world of the child, the verbal and non-verbal

According to Berk & Meyer (2016) make-believe play is an example of the development of representation in early childhood (p.312). Play detaches from the real life conditions associated with it: During this observation, when the children were playing in the building area, they knew that the blocks were an object but that it could represent something else, such as they were building castles and towers. According to Berk & Meyer (2016) by age 3, children can understand that an object may take on one fictional identity in one pretend game and another fictional identity in a different pretend game (p.312). Another group of children was playing in the toy cars area, they were pretending that they were the ones driving the car in a race. This is an example of sociodramatic play. According to Berk & Meyer (2016), a sociodramatic play is the make-believe play with others that is under way by the end of the second year and that increases rapidly in complexity during early childhood (p.312). Yet, I noticed that during this play time some children struggle more than others, it was hard for some children to have an understanding of roles in the game due to the fact that they couldn't follow the plot or where impatient to wait for their turn. This is a skill that children master at the end of preschool years. Interestingly, despite that many children were playing in groups, there was this one child, a boy with dark hair

Introduction Subject “Chris” is a 7 year old middle class Caucasian male. Observation is taking place in the child’s home over the course of two separate afternoons. Chris is a friendly and well spoken child who is small for his age. Chris is the youngest child in his family and both observations take place while his siblings are home. In each case one or both parents are absent.

Social play becomes more prominent during preschool age when children being to socialise with other children and practitioners within the pre-school. They tend to carry on playing alone but will play near a wide range of their peers. The development change involved in this types of play is pre-schoolers cognitive development. Social play involves children interacting with their peers and practitioners in the setting this can be done using speaking, signing and body language. When participating in social play this can involve game rules that the children have to communicate and consider when playing together.

| 3. Event Sampling Target behavior: Children playing with a toy or material Time | Observation | 10:20 | At the snack table “L” was sitting and eating cereal. And “A” was playing with the stuffed animal. “L” got up from the chair and grabbed the toy from “A” and threw the toy across the classroom. “A” started to cry. The teacher saw what happened and went over to them. And she said to ”L” is throwing a good thing. And she made “L” go pick the toy up and bring it to “A”.

For this child observation, I decided to observe my younger brother Jacob. Jacob is 5 years old, but he insisted that I write that he is almost 6. He is also in kindergarten this year and loving every second of being a loud, rowdy boy. I suppose I am at an advantage in this observation since I have seen the numerous developments in Jacob’s life thus far.

Through play, children are also able to form relationships with their peers, therefore developing socially. They are able to “learn how to work in groups, to share, to negotiate, to resolve conflicts, and to learn self-advocacy skills” all of which are important skills in a child’s world as well as the adult world (Ginsberg 183). This is especially prevalent in young school age children, who have had relatively few social encounters without the presence of their parents before entering school. These young children will often make life time friends by sharing a popular treat at snack time or borrowing a color crayon to another child who has broken theirs.