Piaget's Theory Of Brain Development

Why is that some may wonder? The answer is simple, the human brain is a plastic organism, and because of that plasticity children are more vulnerable to the effects of trauma. The Branch Davidian children are a prime example of the harm physical, psychological, emotional, and verbal abuse may have on young kid’s brain development. Brain development begins as early as 3 weeks after conception, with continual growth occurring as individual’s age. In the first stages of brain development neurons and connections are growing.

Children move from being solely reliant on on their parents in childhood to obtaining more independence in the young adult years (Levinson, 1986, p.5). This is the time when the biopsychosocial elements are undergoing rapid growth. Likewise, this is the period where the continuing process of individuation starts. As children are able to differentiate themselves from their parents they begin to recognize the difference between them and others. Also, between the ages of 17-22 there is a transitional period of about five years from pre adulthood to young adulthood.

As each stage is accomplished, a person achieves a higher level of functioning. The sensorimotor stage (birth – 2 years) is where a child develops a sense of themselves as separate for the world and palpable objects still exist even though they cannot be seen. In the preoperational stage (2 – 6 years) the child develops the ability to express themselves through language, they understand the meaning of symbols, and they can classify objects. Concrete operations (6 – 12 years) is the stage when the child applies logic to thinking, is able to understand time and space, broadens social interactions, and is can apply rules; but thinking is still concrete. Egocentrism is central to their thought process with the inability to consider that other people have differing opinions.

Autonomy vs shame and doubt, children from the ages of 1- 3 years are able to comprehend more about their self-image and self-control. Children can also control their body functions by completing certain assignments which gives them the feeling of freedom and self-governance. In Erikson’s third stage of his theory children can understand the difference between what is wrong and right in a social environment. However, children are very easily affected by their errors, and they are not able to see the extent of their actions. As indicated by Erikson 's 4th stage of psychosocial development, children in their middle school years start to perform more convoluted duties and see more perplexing thoughts at this stage.

The aim of this essay is also to explain the developmental milestones focusing mainly on fine and motor development and to bring out what contributes to delays in reaching the milestones, assessing development of children from birth to the age of three. Piagetian/cognitive approach The way children develops takes place in many areas including the physical or motor skills, speech and language, social and emotional, cognitive and intellectual abilities (kid sense child development 2008). Due to these stages of development Piaget came up with a cognitive approach to further explain child development. Cognitive development is when one gets the quality to learn, process information, think and remember with time (Lynn and Wolf 2009). Jean Piaget came up with four stages of cognitive development but

All children are vary in learning speed but everyone would have to go through the same sequence of development stages. Piaget’s Cognitive Development 4 stages are as follow: • Sensorimotor (0-2 years) • Preoperational (2-6 years) • Concrete Operational (6-12 years) • Formal Operational (12 years onwards) The Sensorimotor stage Sensorimotor stage is from birth to two year old. During this stage, infants explore, discover the world surround them through sensation and their motor

Concrete Operations is the third developmental stage by Jean Piaget, in which he talks about how children pass through different stages as they age and develop cognitively. This stage occurs around the age of 7 to 11 years old when children have the capabilities to begin to think logically and are able to perform mental operations by using concrete concepts. In other words the child is finally able to make sense of things, think more rational and realize that things are not always as they may seem.

Three main assumptions exist in the maturational theory including biological development basis, alternating between good and bad years, and personality development correlated with body types. During the mid-1900s, maturational theory firmly affected learning. Not until the children attain a mental age ranging from six and a half years they were thought not to be ripe for evaluations. Effectively, for the children who were not ready for reading, preparedness activities were also enhanced for them to get ready. Unfortunately, such nonsense currently happens in some of our kindergarten, preschools, and probably primary-level classrooms.

In order for the body to be able to perform simple tasks like moving your hands, the brain must develop the relationship between fine motor skills and their association with the different parts of the body. This development typically begins to occur when a child is around 2 months old, as they are able to start moving on their own and associating different actions with body movements. As the child becomes aware of the extent of their mobility, the brain begins to send signals as motor commands, which results in the body’s association with things such as having an itch and raising your hand to your head to scratch it. By eight months, children are typically able to grasp objects and push themselves on their hands and knees and at one year many children are learning to stand unsupported while gaining muscle control in their back and legs. As children continue to grow and develop, hand-eye coordination is being fine-tuned and eventually the dramatic growth in the development of physical skills result in the increased capacity to learn new cognitive skills (Miller et al., 2018).

Social and emotional development: Children go through many different social and emotional developments during their childhood. The first eighteen months of their lives is centered around attachment where they learn to recognise their primary carer and subsequently interact using body language and rudimentary noises. Babies will then develop their interactions with other adults and children in their immediate environment, if this is fostered early on, by nine months, they may begin to branch out showing a willingness to interact with other children and adults who are not the primary carers. As a child grows to the age on one they willhave begun to understand object permanence and begin to show definite emotions and assertivenesswhile also