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Questions and Answers
What is the term used to describe the failure to distinguish others' symbolic viewpoints from one's own?
Which concept involves providing living characteristics to objects that are not alive?
What is the term for the cognitive ability that allows children to organize objects into classes based on similarities and differences?
In Vygotsky's theory, what does the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) represent?
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Which cognitive ability involves the sustained and executive allocation of mental resources?
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What concept in language development refers to understanding and applying grammar rules, sometimes leading to overgeneralization like saying 'goed' instead of 'went'?
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What is a key characteristic of physical development in early childhood (2-6 years)?
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Which part of the brain rapidly grows during early childhood, especially impacting language composition?
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What is the process of myelination important for during early childhood?
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Which area of physical health faces challenges due to environmental risks during early childhood?
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How does hunger and obesity impact children's health during early childhood?
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Which cognitive developmental stage, according to Piaget, characterizes early childhood with symbolic thought?
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Study Notes
Physical Development
- Between 2-6 years of age, children lose their "top-heavy" look from toddlerhood, growing longer and leaner, and gaining 2-3 inches/5 pounds every year.
- Brain growth during this period is multi-directional, with environmental influences impacting language development, particularly in the left prefrontal cortical area.
- Myelination of the reticular formation, amygdala, and corpus callosum occurs, which helps with direction of attention, sensory information, emotions, and connections.
- The process of myelination progresses from back to front, inside and out, explaining why we make more mature decisions later in life.
Gross Motor Skills
- Children develop running, jumping, and pedaling skills, with improved hand-eye coordination.
Fine Motor Skills
- Self-help skills, drawing, and writing abilities emerge, with handedness perception developing.
- Visual development remains slow during this period.
Physical Health
- Injuries are more common among males, with environmental risks, such as transportation injuries, being a major concern.
- Nutrition plays a crucial role, with child hunger and obesity being significant issues, and malnutrition making children more susceptible to disease.
- Immunizations are essential to prevent illnesses and deaths.
Cognitive Development
Piaget's Preoperational Stage
- Substage 1: Symbolic thought, characterized by:
- Representational thinking, where children use objects and events to represent ideas.
- Egocentric thinking, where children fail to distinguish others' symbolic viewpoints from their own.
- Animism, where children attribute life-like characteristics to inanimate objects.
- Substage 2: Intuitive thought, marked by the "Why?" phase.
- Failures of preoperational thinking include:
- Conservation: inability to understand that certain physical characteristics of objects remain the same despite changes in appearance.
- Classification: difficulty in organizing objects into classes and subclasses based on similarities and differences.
Vygotsky's Theory
- Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD): the skill level just above where the child is at, with scaffolding providing guidance to help the child reach the desired level.
- Private speech: children narrate their play, which later becomes their internal monologue.
Information Processing
- Attention: sustained and executive.
- Memory: growth in short-term memory and autobiographical memories, with children's memories influenced by parental questioning and rehearsal.
- Executive functions: toddlers struggle with shifting rules, such as in color and shape games.
Theory of Mind Development
- Testing with unexpected contents and Sally-Anne paradigms to assess children's understanding of false beliefs.
- Influences on Theory of Mind include language development, cognitive abilities, prefrontal cortex development, and make-believe play.
Language Development
- Fast mapping: rapid growth in vocabulary, with children mapping out word meanings.
- Syntactic bootstrapping: understanding and applying grammar rules, with overgeneralization of rules (e.g., "feets" and "goed").
- Pragmatics: understanding culture-specific rules of communication, including formal vs. informal language use.
Early Literacy and Mathematical Reasoning
- Phonological awareness: the ability to reflect on and manipulate the sound structure of spoken language.
- Ordinality and cardinality in mathematical reasoning, with an understanding of counting sequences and quantity.
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Description
Test your knowledge on the physical development of children aged 2 to 6 years old, focusing on body growth and brain growth influences. Learn about the changes in body proportions and the impact of the environment on brain development during early childhood.
