1. Mid-Late Childhood: Physical Development
Human Development & Learning

2. What does Mid-Late Childhood Look Like?
6-year old ballet
8-year old ballet
9-year old ballet
10-year old ballet
Did you see these things:
Increased automaticity, increased muscle control, decreased centration, increased concentration- The six-year old dancer has to concentrate much harder on remembering each movement than dancers in the subsequent videos. She can’t seem to pay attention to her facial expressions and remember her steps at the same time. The 8-year old can dance while controlling her facial expressions, but her expressions don’t look natural and she is not nearly as adept at dancing with her whole body (e.g., from her toes to her finger tipes) as the 9-year old. The 10-year old looks like her movement are coming from within, not like she is having to move her body to dance as if it were a cumbersome object. Her movement flows, she is competent, she almost looks like an accomplished adult dancer. That’s a lot of change!

3. What were you like? When you were in the 1st grade (maybe)
What activities did you like to do?
Who were your friends?
How did you feel about your parents? teachers?
What did you think the future would be like?
When you were in the 6th grade???

4. Body Growth and Change Slow, consistent growth
Children grow an average of 2 to 3 inches a year
They gain about 5 to 7 pounds a year due to increases in the size of the skeletal and muscular systems and size of body organs
Feet get longer, body gets thinner, power increases

5. Brain growth and changes
Total brain volume stabilizes by the end of middle and late childhood
Significant changes in various structures and regions of the brain continue to occur
(Durston & Casey, 2006). (Anderson, Jacobs, & Harvey, 2006) (Toga, Thompson, & Sowell, 2006)

6. Focal Activation in the Prefrontal Cortex
Synaptic pruning -- areas of the brain not being used lose synaptic connections and those being used show an increase in connections
Cognitive control -- which involves flexible and effective control in a number of areas
These areas include controlling attention, reducing interfering thoughts, inhibiting motor actions, and being cognitively flexible in switching between competing choices
(Munkata, 2006)

7. Motor Development
Movement’s become more coordinated, subtle and refined.
Begin to see difference between boys and girls
Boys: Better at rough motoric skills
Girls: Better at fine motor skills
Increased myelination of the central nervous system is shown in improvement of fine motor skills
Fine motor coordination develops so that children can write rather than print words

8. Health, Illness, Disease, Accidents, and Injuries
Disease and death are less prevalent than during other periods in childhood and in adolescence
Injuries are the leading cause of death during middle and late childhood
most common cause of severe injury and death is motor vehicle accidents, either as a pedestrian or as a passenger
other serious injuries involve bicycles, skateboards, roller skates, and other sports equipment
most accidents occur in or near the child’s home or school
(Hockenberry, 2005)

9. Cancer 
Second-leading cause of death in U.S. children 5 to 14 years of age
Incidence of cancer in children is increasing
1 in 330 children develops cancer before the age of 19
Child cancers mainly attack the white blood cells (leukemia), brain, bone, lymph system, muscles, kidneys, and nervous system
(Neglia & others, 2001) (Savell & others, 2004)

11. Overweight
The percentage of U.S. children who are at risk for being overweight has doubled from 15 % in the 1970s to almost 30 % today
Girls are more likely than boys to be overweight
Being overweight is less common in African-American than in non-Latino white children during childhood, but during adolescence this reverses
(Flegal, Ogden, & Carroll, 2004) (Paxson & others, 2006)

12. Risks Caused by Overweight
Being overweight raises the risk for many medical and psychological problems
Overweight children can develop lung problems and hip problems
Other problems include high blood pressure, elevated blood cholesterol levels, and type 2 diabetes
Low self-esteem, depression, and problems in peer relations are common
(Arif & Rohrer, 2006) (Daniels, 2006) (Bindler & Bruya, 2006) (Janssen & others, 2004)

13. Causes of Increase in Overweight Children
Changes in diet
Total caloric intake has also increased
Time spent watching TV
Inadequate levels of exercise
Children are more fatigued by long periods of sitting than by running, jumping, or bicycling
Why are they not exercising? How do we change this?
(Nielsen, Siega-Riz, & Popkin, 2002) (Giammattei & others, 2003)

14. Prevention of Overweight
Parents play an important role by:
encouraging healthy eating habits in children by eating more family meals together, and making healthy foods available
not keeping sugar-sweetened beverages and other unhealthy foods in the home
reducing children’s TV time
getting children involved in sports and other physical activities
being healthy, physically active models themselves
(Lindsay & others, 2006) (Salmon, Campbell, & Crawford, 2006)

15. Asthma Asthma is chronic inflammation of the airways.
It affects between 10% and 20% of school-age children in North America
three times as common as 20 years ago
figures expected to double again by 2020

16. Possible Causes of Asthma
genes on chromosomes 2, 11, 12, 13, and 21
exposure to allergens (dust, pet dander, etc.)
LARRY MULVEHILL / PHOTO RESEARCHERS, INC.

17. Prevention of Asthma Clean air Breast feeding, remove pets from home
Inhalers, medical treatment
Many lower-income children lack insurance to get proper care!