Stages of Child Development
For each behavior listed below, guess the approximate age at
which a child performs the behavior.
__________ 1. Distinguishes between oneself and what is not oneself
__________ 2. Forms social attachment to primary caregiver
__________ 3. Can dress him or herself alone
__________ 4. Can run, climb, and throw a ball
__________ 5. Can distinguish a sweet taste from a bitter taste
__________ 6. Is toilet trained
__________ 7. Wants to go out and play with other children
__________ 8. Awareness of object permanence
Stages of Child Development
For each behavior listed below, guess the approximate age at
which a child performs the behavior.
__________ 9. Grasps the concept of conservation of number
__________ 10. Grasps the concept of conservation of volume
__________ 11. Begins to understand simple cause-and-effect relationships
__________ 12. Plays pat-a-cake
__________ 13. Has a vocabulary of around 1,000 words
__________ 14. Can sit up with some support
__________ 15. Can walk alone
__________ 16. Recognizes household members
Stages of Child Development
Answers
1. 1 year
9. 6 years
2. 6 months
10. 11 years
3. 6ish years
11. 1-2 years
4. 4 years
12. 9-12 months
5. Newborn
13. 3 years
6.1 1/2 years
14. 4 months
7. 4-5 years
15. 15 months
8. 1 year
16. 3-6 months
Study of growth and changes as we
progress through the life cycle.
(Physical, Social, Moral, Cognitive)
Capacities?
• Newborns have the ability at birth to see,
hear, smell and respond to the environment.
Reflexes must be triggered by the right stimulus…
• Reflexes: Inherited, automatic, coordinated
movement patterns
1. Rooting
and Sucking
2. Walking or Stepping
3. Grasping or Palmer
4. Startle or Moro
5. Babinski
Rooting:
•
If the infant is touched anywhere near the mouth,
he/she will more their head and mouth toward the
source.
•
Disappears around 4 months and becomes
voluntary…
Sucking:
•
Accompanies rooting
•
Automatically suck anything that touches mouth or
roof of mouth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NksbJQr5_xw&feature=related

Present at birth;
› Can’t support own weight…
Soles of feet touch a flat surface infants
will attempt to “walk” placing one foot in
front of the other.
 This reflex disappears at 6 weeks as an
automatic response


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bal9fYVGv74&feature=related
› Infants response to a touch
on the palm of the hand.
a. Strength?
John B. Watson, a godfather of American behaviorist
psychology, tests the grasp reflex in a baby, circa 1916-20.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FV-qWSVNFt8&feature=related
› A response to an unexpected noise or
when the infant feels as if they are falling.
Following the startle, infants will spread out arms and legs
and grasp upward
›

Disappears by 4-5 months.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsLqoT4fIH8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsLqoT4fIH8
Babinski Reflex
How would you respond to someone running
their thumbnail up the center or side of the
bottom of your foot?
Your toes would curl and your foot would
withdraw.
Before an infants first birthday, they have the
exact opposite response….
Babinski Reflex
Upon stimulation of the side
of the foot, infants extend
the big toe.
 In time the Babinski response
vanishes and, under normal
circumstances, should never
return.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHRTXorQkyQ&feature=related
Perceptual Development
• Do infants have depth
perception?
• Gibson and Walk 1960 –
Visual Cliff
– 6+ Months – Refuse
– Newborns – increase in
heart rate suggesting
some perceptual abilities
Language Development
Several steps in learning language…
• Cry --> Cooing --> Babble (includes all sounds
humans can make – Chinese vowels, African clicks etc…)
• ONE YEAR -->Imitate sounds of language that
surrounds them --> Sounds become words
• TWO YEARS --> Words (500 – 1,500) Simple
sentences…
• THREE YEARS --> Combining words to make
complex sentences
• 18 MONTHS – 5 YEARS --> Add 5-10
words/day
Cognitive Development?
• Jean Piaget
• Through research, found
that intelligence, or the
ability to understand,
develops gradually.
• We use different logic to
understand the world
around us.
How Knowing Changes…
• Understanding the world
involves mental
representations of the
world (called SCHEMAS)
• Each of us constructs
intellectual schemas,
applying them and
changing them as needed.
Dog schema = 4 legs and fluffy
Assimilation vs. Accommodation
• We try to understand a new
or different object or concept
by using one of our
preexisting schemas.
• Assimilation: We try to fit
the new object into
existing schemas.
• Accommodation: We
change our schema to fit
the characteristics of the
new object.
Assimilation and Accommodation
• A child believes that "All furry four legged
animals are dogs". He sees a breed of dog that
he's never seen before and says, "That's a
dog." That's assimilation.
• Then the child sees a horse (or a cat, squirrel
whatever) and the child says, "That's a dog."
But his parents tell him it isn't a dog, it's a
horse. So the child accommodates, "Not all
furry four legged animals are dogs, some are
raccoons."
Assimilation and Accommodation
• Young children can go from riding a big wheel
to riding a tricycle with no problem--they can
assimilate--it is 'sort of the same'; but to go to
a bicycle there is much accommodation that
must take place.
Assimilation and Accommodation
• A child learns his father is
called Daddy, so he calls other
males ( e.g. the mailman)
Daddy. This is assimilation.
• He is quickly told that the
other man is not Daddy, he is
Bob. Again, the schema for
“Daddy” is modified. This is
accommodation.
Adults and Assimilation and
Accommodation?
• When I was growing up my parents believed
that tattoos were bad, so I created a schema
for people with tattoos. I assimilated such
information as "probably rides a motorcycle,"
"is dirty," and "probably has been in jail" into
this schema during my childhood (because
that's what my parents said).
• When I got to college, I met a lot of people
with tattoos who did not fit into my schema,
and thus had to do some accommodation to
accept those people.
Game
• You are to create a game that is designed to
help children practice assimilation and
accommodation.
• Be creative!!