What is childhood development? child development is a long procedure. It starts from childbirth to the beginning of adulthood. Child development refers to the sequential development of physical, language, emotional, social, and cognitive areas. The child is totally dependent on their parents, carers, or guardians at the beginning. They run into total independence later. The two main factors of child development are genetic factors and the life events during prenatal life. The environmental factors are contributing mainly to child development.
Well-planned targeted therapeutic approaches are very good. It can actively improve the level of child development. So we suggest, the child development is a modifiable thin. It combines with environmental, genetic, parental, and other social factors a lot.
You need to get basic advice from the professionals such as occupational therapists, speech therapists, pediatricians. They will track the milestones of your child’s development. Finally, you can get maximum output with regard to all development areas of your child.
The main developmental areas of childhood development
Child development covers a bundle of skill set which the child masters over their life span. It includes various developmental areas such as
- Physical skills-Fine motor and gross motor skills
- Social skills and emotional regulation-Mastering self-control and social interaction
- Communication skills including speech and language – Reading, communication and understanding gestures and body language
- Cognitive skills and intellectual functions.- Problem-solving ability and critical thinking
- Sensory processing ability and sensory awareness – perceive and register various sensory inputs and respond to them accordingly
What is childhood development and why it is important
Observing childhood development is a skill. Through observation, we can identify whether the child is meeting his/her landmarks in various developmental areas above mentioned. Those landmarks refer to “childhood milestones”. Childhood milestones are an essential tool in assessing child development.
Developmental Milestones are
A well-documented list of developmental skill sets that is believed to be mastered by the children in various age categories of their life. It crafts the exact clear picture of ideal child development guidelines.
These developmental milestones help parents to check whether the “child is on track” in developing physically, mentally, and socially. So, This early detection of any hiccups in child development can also present later with the child/mother service providers, pediatricians assess infants and toddlers, later through school teacher’s assessments.
The early detection of the developmental challenges will help to minimize the negative impact of these developmental problems. Then teachers, parents, and other carers can improve the child’s skills, self-confidence, and other social and emotional skills.
Developmental milestone checklists
These checklists are used as guides. These guides are categorized into each age category. Then anyone can highlight any significant delay in development. Dear parents, now you should be able to identify that the child’s development appears according to the predictable sequelae.
Related – Child development checklist for infant and toddler age catogories
All the children are unique in their developmental journey
How do you manage a problem in child development
Most developmental problems arise due to genetic factors, parental circumstances, or in the presence of a medical diagnosis. These problems should be solved firstly with your GP or pediatrician. Then you need to go for special professional bodies like occupational therapists, speech therapists, psychologists, etc.
These professionals can apply suitable solutions to your child to overcome the existing problems. Treatments should start with social skills building and emotional management first. The frustration or the self-esteem can be estimated by seeing the way they ate, building various skills.
Cognitive development
The cognitive development of a child refers, how a child thinks, learns, understands, solves problems, and remembers things. This is a very important area.
Language development
With this language development, children learn how to use body language and other signs to communicate ideas. Then they start to produce various sounds, words, and parts of sentences and ultimately total words. Children use their own learning patterns to master those skills.
Social and emotional development-Major area of childhood development
Social development is how children learn to develop relationships and cooperate with family, friends, and teachers. Emotional development is how children learn to express, understand, and manage their own emotions, as well as respond to the emotions of others.
Social development improves the learning ability of social relationships. They develop various relationships to cope up with their family, friends, teachers, and carers, etc. Children express their own emotions and manage them using emotional development
Physical development
How children learn to move and use their muscles. This can be separated into large motor skills (such as using muscles to sit, stand, walk, run, keep balance, and change positions) and small motor skills (such as using hand muscles to eat, draw, dress, and write)
Physical development helps children to move their muscles and cooperate with various movements. This expands to large gross motor skills such as walk, sit, run, keep balance, and change positions and some fine motor skills such as using hands to eat, write, draw, dress and write.
Steps of the emotional development-Major area in childhood development
- Start with facial expressions. Very fine facial expressions can be done.
- Fear to strangers
- Shy with strangers
- Anxious with strangers
- Seek parent’s attachment and start to cry when parents disappear
- Can achieve short attention away from the parents
- Shows interest in affection
- Show signs of separation anxiety
- Having fear for imaginary things.
- Can separate from mom and dad.
- Getting upset when major changes to the routines
- Temper tantrums
- Demanding things
- Outgrows early childhood fears
Conclusion
Childhood development starts with childbirth. It extends up to the beginning of adulthood. There are many components in childhood development. Also, It involves physical, socio-emotional, cognitive, linguistic development as well. Parents can scan their child’s development through a milestone checklist.
There are many problems related to child development. You need to seek support from a relevant professional body to find an answer to those problems. Even though the children don’t achieve their developmental milestones at the same time, their developmental journey is unique.
Observing a child’s development is a skill. Planned therapeutical approaches are helpful in childhood development areas. It is a complex thing to look at what is childhood development at once. If you need to get an idea you need to look towards a child holistically.
Child development covers a bundle of skill set which the child masters over their life span. It includes various developmental areas such as physical,social,cognitive,emotional,social, and commiunication skills
Hi Chinthaka! Loved this article in child development. Just to ask, what are some of the developmental milestones of a 4 year old in the socio emotional aspect? Also, what are some ways you’ll recommend to hone a child’s holistic development? Would love to hear your answers! Thank you again for the article highlighting the importance of child development!
hi, thank you very much for actively participating in my article.
Age 4 child means a pre-schooler.In this age limit, it is more advisable for them to enhance social participation. Teamwork, making friends, cope with others, enjoyment, decision making, are the key aspects of development with regard to that age limit.
pay your attention to your child whether he/she is gradually improving their relationship networks. Engage them with team activities, read my other article and kindly comment on how you wish to apply those techniques with your kids.
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The development of our child is very important and we need to pay attention to it. I also know we can not compare our child with other children. Each child is unique in their development stages. This would also ease some pressure upon ourselves if goals are not meet in timeframes that other children have marked. Now, concerning language development, would it be expected for a 4 year-old boy to have basic conversations?
I am excited that you enjoyed the article and wish to give you more ideas about the verbal development of children. please read my article and comment with your good views on that
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