Developmental_Delays

Developmental Delays The Effects of Developmental Delays and The Environment Have on Children. Angela Booth ECE205: Introduction to Child Development Leslie VonDerhaar May 16, 2012 Developmental Delays 1 Developmental delays can occur when children do not achieve expected milestones. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics children need to consume a certain number of total daily calories along with the right nutrients in order to obtain proper growth and development. Iron deficiency anemia is a common health condition among children of low income families, this can have very serious effects on a child’s growth (Keefer, 2010). Besides good nutrition children need a positive and supportive environment to be able to learn and grow in. Children who are exposed to domestic violence at a young age are more likely to develop behavior problems. Research shows those family risk factors such as living in an abusive home or not being able to have an emotional bond with a loving caregiver can alter a child’s emotional and cognitive development and social and language skills as well (Keefer, 2010). Young children need cognitive stimulation that should include plenty of opportunities for imaginative free play to develop as physically and mentally healthy individuals. Children also need a lot of emotional support from adults. Play is essential to a child’s development for many reasons. For one play allows a child to interact with others, plus it helps them develop both socially and physically. Some structured play is a way to increase a child’s physical activity and help develop their fine motor skills but without the right kind of nutrition, environment and physical activities, and proper care developmental delays can impact the learning needs of children. Developmental Delays 2 Educators should understand typical behaviors when planning a curriculum because a curriculum addresses the development of knowledge and understanding, processes and skills, dispositions and attitudes. A curriculums content is designed to achieve long range goals for children in all areas of social, emotional, cognitive, and physical development and is used to prepare children with knowledge and skills that they will be able to use in their own daily lives (Allen & Marotz, 2010). A curriculum helps teachers apply a framework to teach children with a wide range of abilities and individual learning objectives. One way a teacher can design a curriculum that best suites a classroom as a whole is by observing children as they participate in different learning activities. This allows the teacher to identify each child’s levels of learning, plus it provides a really practical way for teachers to get to know all of the children in their classrooms so they can organize and modify activities in a curriculum so that children of all kinds of abilities develop across all domains of development and are able to progress to the next level of learning (NAEYC, 2010). A curriculums content should reflect and generate the needs and interests of each individual child within a group. A curriculum should provide a wide variety of learning experiences, materials and equipment and instructional strategies to accommodate a broad range of children’s individual differences in prior experiences, maturing rates, styles of learning, needs and interests (NAEYC, 2010). Curriculum respects and should support individual, cultural, and linguistic diversity and should Developmental Delays 3 support and encourage positive relationships with children and the people around them. Every child is different and they develop physically, mentally and emotionally at their own rate and there are milestones of child development keep in mind that these are just guidelines. Since every child is different it is probably a lot easier to say what behaviors are not typical or normal. Aggression is one behavior that is not normal, although most children do go through an aggressive state usually around toddlerhood. However though if this aggression and violent behavior continues or they tend to have a lack of social skills or they do not respond when there are attempts to try and calm them down this could be an indicator or sign of a disorder such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), or it could also be a reflection of how other people have treated them such as abuse or bullying but either way it can make learning difficult for them. When a child is very slow to learn to describe certain objects, or learn to talk, read, or write this might be due to being dyslexic, have hearing or seeing problems, or maybe even possible autism. Since teachers are trained to recognize certain problems this is probably the most important reason for teacher observation because this is sometimes the only way a problem gets detected (Wellsphere, 2012). Developmental Delays 4 Three specific components in a preschool curriculum that make them highly effective are comprehension and vocabulary, alphabet knowledge, and some concepts of print. Language and literacy seemed to be connected from infancy and on. Speaking, listening, reading, and writing develop together rather than one after the other. Literacy and language become social skills because young children want to be able to communicate and be able to interact with others. Literacy usually occurs through interactions, experiences, and different activities since children all differ in how fast they learn most of their literacy and language skills happen naturally during play and everyday experiences but some depend on certain instruction from observant teachers. So to make a preschool curriculum effective early literacy strategies and activities need to be implemented into an everyday learning plan. Children benefit by a variety of regular group experiences in preschool programs. There should be small-group time, large-group time, and transition times. In small and Large group times teachers should introduce children to new materials, ideas and activities this allows children the opportunity to explore and learn. Specific skills and concepts in literacy and mathematics should be introduced during these groups times, plus children need to be given an opportunity to take initiative to make choices on their own too when it comes to learning new skills. Developmental Delays 5 As children’s minds develop they engage themselves into learning activities by observing or paying attention to something to learn how it works. Preschoolers gather information about the world by using their senses, an example of this discovery is they look, smell, touch, and taste the ice-cream as they listen to the teacher read them a book. They also learn how to classify or sort things by comparing what is the same and what is different, an example of this process is recognizing that red balls and blue balls are different colors but also can be sorted by size such as big and small. Another way a child learns is by experimenting. They like to see how things work, an example of this is putting a toy car on a steep ramp to see how fast it can go. Lastly they like to draw a conclusion and construct knowledge in their own way. They can form theories based on their own experiences. So to make a preschool curriculum more effective for children they need areas and activities that allow them to explore the world around them. For children who have special needs there are always ways to make adaptations so they can also share in the experiences an example might be children blowing bubbles but some children with special needs might not be able to blow through a wand, so you could provide them other tools that can make bubbles such as an egg beater to whisk up some bubble fun. Learning doesn’t need to be predictable it just needs to be creative and fun. Developmental Delay 6 The early years of life should present a child an opportunity to have a foundation laid out for healthy development. This is a time when great growth and vulnerability should set in. Research on early childhood shows that the first five years of a child’s life has the most impact on his/her social-emotional development and negative experiences can impair a child’s mental health and effect their cognitive, behavioral, and social- emotional development. Between 9.5 and 14.2 percent of children between birth and five years old experience social-emotional problems that negatively effect their functioning, development, and school readiness. Boys tend to have greater behavior problems then girls do. So in order to make learning work for children and the educators as well there needs to be a plan or guide designed around each individual child’s own needs to make sure he child learns on the level he or she is ready for. REFERENCES Allen, K & Marotz, L. (2010). Developmental Profiles. Pre-Birth Through Twelve. 6th ed. Cengage. Belmont, CA. Keefer, A. (2010). Sources of Impact on Early Childhood Development. http://www.livingstrong.com http://www.wellsphere.com/parentingarticle/what-is-normal-behavior-in-children