Child Development

Bellringer: Name a time when you said to yourself, “I’ll never do that again.” Describe the experience. How did you learn from the moment? Think of both positives and negatives

Much like infants, toddlers learn through their experiences, both positive and negative. Earlier years, the child is just trying to make sense of the world. Now once a child hits 2-3 they have learned so much that they can engage in imagination, developing their own ideas, and begin to investigate to world.

Ways toddlers learn Incidental learning- unplanned Trial and error learning- takes several tries before it works Imitation- watching/ copying Directed learning- being taught

Intellectual Activity Learning is rapid at this stage. Children begin to grow in the following areas of intellectual activity: Attention Memory Perception Reasoning Imagination Creativity Curiosity

Attention At any given moment your senses are bombarded At young age, it is difficult to focus on one task and toddlers can easily be distracted. As children mature, and work on activities that involve attention, children begin to grow in this area.

Memory Children are able to react to a situation by remembering similar experience in the past Ex: Afraid of dog because got bit by one At age of 3 children begin to develop long term memory and begin to retain facts, observations, and personal history: The girls next door is names Keisha I love to go to the park

Perception Perception is the information one received through senses. This information reinforces established connections in the brain and sparks new ones Gradually the brain organizes itself to handle increasingly complex learning as a child grows Its important to talk to child and ask, “what you are doing?” to encourage child's perceptions Asking why, what's that?

Reasoning Necessary to gain the ability to solve problems and make decisions and is also important in recognizing relationships and forming concepts. Toddlers gradually learning more sophisticated reasoning skills 1 ½ : playing with shape sorter (trial and errors, trying to fit object in hole until one fits) 3: less physical more mental. Recognize the shape and puts correct shape in right whole

Imagination Becomes very apparent at 2 years of age Enhances learning because it allows the child to try new things and act out a variety of roles

Creativity Mental ability in which the imagination is used to produce original ideas. Displayed through objects like drawing and finger painting.

Curiosity Most children are curious about the work. Its curiosity that causes children to wonder why and how about things

It is important to create a strong learning environment for toddlers because they are constantly learning. Designing learning activities that hit each of these areas are a great way to help children grow intellectually.

Toddler Activity You are going to have about 10 minutes to complete the toddler learning activity. While you are playing the game, think about: how the toddler would like this game. What aspect of intellectual activity does this activity promote? (attention, memory, creativity, curiosity etc.) Discuss as a group and answer on a separate sheet of paper. 1 per group Be prepared to share what your game was as well as your thoughts about the game to the class.