Paper Example: Milestones Chart

The developmental milestones mainly act as the critical checkpoints in the development of any child that helps in determining what averagely the child is capable of doing during a specific age. The parents, teachers, and healthcare professionals need to understand the developmental milestones for different ages since it can provide insights concerning normal child development. Understanding developmental milestones can help the parties in identifying potential problems with delayed development. The physical milestones consist of the development of both the great and excellent motor skills of the children. Large motor skills are understood as the first development in a child, including standing and sitting. Fine motor skills usually take place at a later age, which entails learning dome things such as eating and drawing with a crayon. The cognitive milestones consist of the child`s developmental ability to think or even solve problems that they may encounter during their life. The social and emotional milestones entail the ability of the children to express their own emotions and respond to different social interactions that may take place in their lives with others.

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• Theorist
• Maturation
• Gesell Constructivism
• Piaget, Vygotsky, Montessori, Bronfenbrenner Behaviorism
• Pavlov, Skinner, Watson, Bandura
• Domain Physical
• Infants
• (zero to 18 months)
• Toddlers
• (18 months to three years)
• Preschoolers

(three and four years) The maturational theory of child development, as introduced by Dr.Arnold Gesell, mostly focused on maturational growth on both normal and exceptional children. Based on the theory, a child`s development is influenced by both their environment and genes. The rate of development in children is mostly based on the growth of their nervous system. He identified that the infants prefer laying with their heads turned on one side.

The cephalocaudal trend is understood as the pattern of changing spatial proportions over a particular period, especially during the growth. The trend takes place from the conception to 5 months when the head of a child is believed to grow bigger than the rest of the body. The theorists mainly focused on how infants learn different behaviors. They emphasized that the child`s learning can only be successful through interaction with others and outside experiences. The theorists emphasized how infants and toddlers are expected to respond to different stimuli with some particular behaviors.

Cognitive

Infants

(zero to 18 months)

Toddlers

(18 months to three years)

Preschoolers

(three and four years) The theorists understood that children learn by determining their schedules of different activities between the ages of 18 months and three years. The theorists mainly focused on the nature and development of a child`s intelligence. They believed that childhood plays play a significant role in the brain development of a child. The theorists believed that children could develop language through their ability to acquire retaining and recalling knowledge.

SocialInfants

(zero to 18 months)

Toddlers

(18 months to three years)

Preschoolers

(three and four years) The theorists believed that children develop different forms of social relationships since they behave differently in different age stages. The theorists believed that the social relationships of children between the ages of three and four take place mainly because of the social activities they engage in. The theorists believed that social relationships take place because of the social interaction practices that are mainly influenced by the social environment that the children live in.

EmotionalInfants

(zero to 18 months)

Toddlers

(18 months to three years)

Preschoolers

(three and four years) The maturational theory believes that their socializing forces greatly impact the emotional development in children with the people surrounding them, especially their parents and teachers. The theorists believed that emotional development occurs in children between the ages of 18 months to three years through their sense of guilt and shame. The theorists believed that emotional development takes place in the children because of their environmental interactions.

Part 2: Comparing and Contrasting Theories

Maturation vs. Constructivism Theories

The maturation theory identifies different problems as an issue of reinforcement. The theory identifies reinforcement as anything that has the capability of resulting in an increase in behavior or even remaining the same. That does not necessarily mean that the behavior has to be desired (Winnicott, 2018). Reinforcement on the constructivism theory, on the other hand, refers to when a child presents something that leads to an increase in behavior. Both positive and negative reinforcement in both theories does not necessarily mean the behavior reinforced by the children. However, rather it refers to either the presentation or the removal of a stimulus after a particular behavior.

Constructivism vs. Behaviourism Theories

The constructivism theory emphasizes the development of different concepts in a way that all the children, regardless of their age groups, can understand them in a way that makes sense to them. Behaviorism theory, on the other hand, emphasizes the responsibility of the environmental factors towards influencing the way children can understand different concepts. Under the behaviorism theory, children usually learn new concepts through classical conditioning. Unlike the constructivism theory, the behaviorism theory accepts the existence of different cognitions and emotions (Voinea & Damian, 2014). The theorists prefer not to study them since it is only the observable behavior that has the capability of being objectively and scientifically measured. The theory, therefore, mainly emphasizes internal events, which include how thinking should be explained based on the behavioral terms.

Both constructivism and behaviorism theories are more focussed on observable behaviors. They also focus on the fact that learning new things by the children is based on their ability to interpret or understand them in different concepts. The theories still focus on the fact that the learning of new things can only take place more with the help of social interaction with other people. Meaningful learning only takes place in children when different learning activities need to be understood by the children. The theories focus on the fact that the children need to understand and make different connections beyond what their parents or teachers usually teach them.

Maturation vs. Behaviourism Theories

One of the key differences between the two theories is that maturational theory emphasizes the child`s development based on the different predictable stages. Although the behaviorism theory focuses on the development in different stages, it does not necessarily focus on biological development. Both theirs are similar in the way they predict that every child goes through the same series of fixed sequences, although each of them has their unique rate and space (Copple & Bredekamp, 2009). Both maturational and behaviorism theories focus on the idea that the children are products in their environments, but what plays a greater role in their genes, culture as well as the intelligence of each child. Both theories focus on different things that are ahead of their developmental schedules, which means that once he maturity of the child`s nervous system has completely taken place, then it means that they would immediately begin mastering different activities, which include walking and talking from their inner urges.

References

Copple, C., & Bredekamp, S. (2009). Developmentally appropriate practice in early childhood programs serving children from birth through age 8 (Vol. 1313, pp. 22205-4101). Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children.

Voinea, M., & Damian, M. (2014). The role of socio-emotional development in early childhood. Journal Plus Education, 388-392. https://uav.ro/jour/index.php/jpe/article/view/299

Winnicott, D. W. (2018). The maturational processes and the facilitating environment: Studies in the theory of emotional development. Routledge.