Middle Childhood- Years in Elementary School Cognitive Development

Development Children grow and develop at different rates and this effects their sense of self and peer relationships ~6yrs Gross motor skills are pretty good Childhood & Adolescence: Rectangular Formation Myelinates which increase alertness; Frontal Lobe synapse connections increase leading to increased attention, concentration and planning ~7-8yrs Can inhibit responses better and block out more extraneous stimuli ~8 yrs Myelination of areas needed for higher order thinking skills ~8-9 yrs Fine motor skills are more refined; Eye hand coordination improves (Maturing corpus callosum) ~20-24 yrs Myelination completes (particularly in the frontal lobes)

Piaget’s Concrete Operational Stage: 6-12 yrs Decenter- Can think about more than one thing or dimension of a situation Reverse Relationships- One change reverses the effects of another charge Deduce- can draw logical conclusions Domain of knowledge effects abilities Concrete- No abstract thinking Hard to evaluate own beliefs & ideas; Hard to distinguish between own assumptions & objective facts (I think/feel, therefore it is true); ~5-7 can problem solve

Memory & Attention Working Memory (Short-term Memory) Sensory Memory Long-term Memory Retrieval-Remembering (recog & recall) Declarative Knowledge Semantic Episodic Non Declarative Knowledge Procedural Physical Skills Infant & Toddlers Script

Memory & Attention Improves with Age Processing speed Attention to many pieces of information Knowledge base Reconstruction of events Chunking Distinction of Fantasy from Reality Advanced logical thinking Memory strategies Meta cognition own thoughts)

Applications Memory is affected by affective and social development (motivation) Teach: Learning strategies, Encourage Narrations, Scaffold Cognitive therapy for children Self-monitoring Self-instruction

Social Cognition How we other people and social relationships Skills of friendship are heavily dependent on cognitive development and poor skills effect emotional well being, academic achievement and behavior, and overall adjustment and self-concept Relationships reduce ego centrism & promote altruism Peers become secure base

Selman’s 5 stages PG 217 Where are you in your primary relationships? With your parents? With your friends?

Relationship Skills Perspective Taking Need for intimacy Balancing own needs w/out sacrificing relationship One’s ability to solve conflict WITHOUT perspective taking, momentary insensitivity feels like a personal insult. How often do YOU do this?

Selman’s Perspective taking is limited Conflict is struggle to get one’s way Resolution strategies: flight/fight Understand other’s have different perspectives, but can only focus on one at a time (more centered) and believe either their own or authorities is correct Friendship is : What do I get out of this vs. mutual satisfaction Conflict: to be resolved by the one who initiated it-no mutual consensus walk in another’s moccasins to evaluate intentions & actions Can conceive of feeling one way, but acting another way Can feel conflicted emotions toward friends Conflict resolution: both parties must compromise

Selman’s –can take objective view of both perspectives Egocentrism reduced Mutual support and shared intimacy (we) Conflict resolution: to enhance relationship Problems don’t reside in one individual Can say “we are both good people, not just good together” Adopt perspective of social group/society Understand no one perspective is the only correct one (regardless of how deeply values it is) Other Transforming Self Transforming

Why does it matter to Therapists Social Increase perspective taking Teach conflict resolution Teach balancing of own needs and relational needs Help child learn to utilize skills they have Learning Teach: use of adaptation and scaffolding How to learn Chunking, encoding, self-monitoring, problem- solving, learning strategies, encourage narrations