1. Development Through the Lifespan
Chapter 7
Physical and Cognitive
Development in
Early Childhood
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2. Physical Development in Early Childhood
Body Growth Slows
Shape becomes more streamlined
Skeletal Growth Continues
New growth centers
Lose baby teeth
Asynchronies
Brain, lymph nodes grow fastest

3. Brain Development in Early Childhood
Frontal lobe areas for planning and organization develop.
Left hemisphere active
Language skills
Handedness
Linking areas of the brain develop
Cerebellum, reticular formation, corpus callosum

4. Influences on Physical Growth and Health
Heredity and Hormones
Growth hormone, thyroid-stimulating hormone
Emotional Well-Being
Psychosocial dwarfism
Nutrition
Infectious Disease
Immunization
Childhood Injuries

5. Factors Related to Childhood Injuries
Individual Differences
Gender
Temperament
Poverty, low parental education
More children in the home
Societal conditions
International differences

6. Motor Skill Development in Early Childhood
Gross Motor Skills
Walking, running smoother
Catching, throwing, swinging, riding
Fine Motor Skills
Self-help: dressing, eating
Drawing

7. Progression of Drawing Skills
Scribbles – during 2nd year
First Representational Forms
Label already-made drawings – around age 3
Draw boundaries and people –
3–4 years
More Realistic Drawings – preschool to school age
Early Printing – Ages 3–5

8. Piaget’s Preoperational Stage
Ages 2 to 7
Gains in Mental Representation
Make-believe Play
Limitations in Thought — Cannot Perform Mental Operations
Egocentrism
Conservation
Hierarchical Classification

9. Limits on Conservation
Centration – Focus on one aspect and neglect others
Irreversibility – Cannot mentally reverse a set of steps

10. Early Childhood Development of Make-Believe
With age, make-believe gradually becomes:
More detached from real life conditions
Less self-centered
More complex
Sociodramatic Play

11. Piagetian Class Inclusion Problem

12. Follow-Up Research on Preoperational Thought
Egocentric Thought
Can adjust language to others and take others’ perspectives in simple situations.
Animistic thinking comes from incomplete knowledge of objects.
Illogical Thought
Can do simplified conservation
Can reason by analogy
Use causal expressions
Categorization
Everyday knowledge is categorized.
Appearance versus reality
Make-believe helps children tell the difference.
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2004

13. Educational Principles Derived from Piaget’s Theory
Discovery learning
Sensitivity to children’s readiness to learn
Developmentally appropriate practice
Acceptance of individual differences

14. Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory and Early Childhood
Private Speech
Helps guide behavior
Gradually becomes more silent
Zone of Proximal Development
Scaffolding supports children’s learning.
Assisted discovery and peer collaboration also help children learn.

15. Model of Information Processing System

16. Improvements in Information Processing
Attention
Planning
Memory
Memory Strategies
Everyday Experiences
Theory of Mind
Metacognition
Emerging Literacy
Mathematical Reasoning
Ordinality, Counting, and Cardinality

17. Development of Theory of Mind
Awareness of Mental Life – infancy – age 3
Mastery of False Beliefs – around age 4

18. Individual Differences in Early Childhood Mental Development
Factors Contributing to Individual Differences:
Home environment
Quality of child care, preschool or kindergarten
Child-centered versus academic
Early intervention programs
Television
Educational TV

19. Child Care Arrangements for Preschoolers

20. Language Development in Early Childhood
Vocabulary
Fast-mapping
Grammar
Overregularization
Conversation
Pragmatics
Supporting Language Development
Expansions
Recasts