Brain? What's that? (Physical growth)
What advances occur in the cerebellum during early childhood?
Motor coordination
What gross motor skill improvements do we see in early childhood?
–Walking, running, jumping, catching, swinging, riding
– Balance improves
– Gait smooth and rhythmic
– Upper- and lower-body skills combine in more refined actions
– Greater speed and endurance
What does sociodramatic play Develop?
coordinating a plot and several roles with others
Pretending is rich in___?
Private speech
What is executive function responsible for?
inhibition, flexible shifting, working memory, planning
What advances occur in the reticular formation during early childhood?
Children are now able to have sustained, controlled attention
What Fine motor skill improvements do we see in early childhood?
– Self-help: dressing, eating
– Drawing and printing
What does dual representation mean and when does it emerge?
• Viewing a symbolic object as both object
and symbol
• Emerges age 3
What does Private speech Mean?
Children’s self-directed speech
This executive function shows major gains in early childhood and allows children to map out steps and consider consequences before acting.
Planning
What advances occur in the Amygdala during early childhood?
Capable of Processing Novelty and emotional information
When are children first capable of scribbling?
It emerges during the second year!
What is egocentrism, and what does it prevent?
It is the Failure to distinguish others’ viewpoints from one’s own
– Prevents reflecting on and revising faulty reasoning
What does Vygotsky's zone of proximal development entail?
a range of tasks too difficult for the child to do alone but possible with the help of others
This type of memory task, in which children identify something they’ve seen before, is performed very well by 4- and 5-year-olds.
Recognition
What advances occur in the Hippocampus during early childhood?
Gains in Memory and Spatial Understanding
At what time do children first draw in representational forms and what is it?
First representational forms: 3–4 years
– Draws first recognizable pictures
– Uses lines for object boundaries, figure in simplest form (universal
“tadpole” image)
– Adds features
What does it mean when told that a child has the inability to conserve and what aspectsa does it have?
Child does not grasp that an object’s physical
characteristics remain the same, even when
appearance changes
Aspects: Centration, Irreversibility
The guidance of adults gradually leads to the development of?
Self Guidance
This memory process involves generating a mental image of something not currently present—something preschoolers struggle with due to limited strategies and developing language.
Recall
What advances occur in the Corpus Callosum during early childhood?
Higher communication between both hemispheres, enabling more complex, coordinated movements and thinking
When are children able to make more complex drawings.
5–6 years
Children have a lack of hierarchical classification. What does this mean?
Cannot organize objects into classes and subclasses
based on similarities and differences
Aiding a child and slowly removing support as the childs skill develops is the defenition of?
Scaffolding
These are descriptions of familiar, routine events that help children organize, interpret, and predict what will happen next—like knowing the steps in “getting ready for bed.”
Scripts
What Hormone Is responsible for the development of body tissue? (BONUS: Which hormone supports it and its function)
Growth Hormone(GH)
BONUS:: Thyroid stimulating hormone is responsible for brain development and supports GH's
When is a childs earliest printing?
Early printing: 4–6 years
What does "centration" mean?
child focus on one aspect, neglecting others
Make believe play can also be included as?
An influential zone of proximal development!
This type of episodic memory involves meaningful, one-time events and improves as children’s cognitive and conversational skills grow.
Autobiographical memory
What percentages of the population are right and left-handed?
BONUS: What does this tell us about their brains?
Right-Handed: 90%—Language is housed in the left hemisphere
Left-Handed: 10% Language is shared between both hemispheres
Bonus: Reflects the dominant cerebral hemisphere
What do boys and girls each excel at respectually in motor skills?
– Boys excel in skills using force and power
– Girls excel in skills using balance and agility
What does "irreversibility" mean?
Child has an inability to mentally reverse a series of
steps.
Mastery of these tasks—typically around age 4—is influenced by language skills, executive function, and social experiences. (Information Processing)
False Belief Tasks
This adult conversational style adds to a child’s statements, providing scaffolding that helps create organized, detailed personal stories.
Elaborative Style
How does body growth change in early childhood? list 3 changes
Slows done and progresses similar to that of an adults
Posture and balance improve
Skeletal growth: New epiphyses emerge, and children lose their baby teeth.
Through what practice do gross motor skills develop?
Through Play
With age Make believe gradually...
– detaches from real-life conditions
– becomes less self-centered
– becomes more complex
By 14–16 months, children show this understanding of order relationships between quantities, and by age 3 they can count five objects. (information processing)
Ordinality
This adult interaction style, involving repeated questions with little elaboration, is weak at promoting autobiographical recall.
Repetitive Style
List 3 Major changes that occur in the brain during early childhood.
• Cognitive capacities increasingly localize in
distinct neural systems
• Rapid growth of prefrontal-cortical areas devoted
to executive function
• Left hemisphere especially active, supporting
language skills and handedness
• Right hemisphere activity steadily increases;
spatial skills develop gradually through
adolescence
Through what practice do Fine motor skills develop?
Through daily Routine
Benefits of make believe include?
Contributes to cognitive and social skills
• Predicts cognitive capacities:
– Executive function
– Memory
– Logical reasoning
– Language and literacy
– Imagination and creativity
– Emotion regulation
– Taking another’s perspective
Between ages 3½ and 4, children understand that the last number in a counting sequence represents the total number of items—an ability that supports solving simple math problems by age 4. (information Processing)
Cardinality
This is a young child’s coherent set of ideas about mental activities, beginning with early, nonverbal awareness and becoming explicit around age 4.
Young Child's Theory of Mind