Stages of Child & Adolescent Development

Stages of Physical Development Cognitive Development Social/ Emotional Development Typical School Situation
Development
Late Childhood • Grow an average of • Use logical thinking • Predominantly focused in needs and • Usually upper elementary school
2-3 inches and 7 with a limited ability to wants of themselves • 3rd to 5th grade
Approximately pounds per year extend logic to abstract • Want to gain social approval • Learning and interacting primarily with
8-11 years of • Puberty begins concepts • Have a tendency to be disorganized and own grade level with close adult
age between 8-13 for • Have ability to apply forgetful supervision at school, both inside and
girls; around 10 for learned concepts to • Little concern about appearance outside the classroom
boys new tasks • Friendships based on proximity,
• Girls become • Interest in learning life common interests
physically larger than skills from adults at • Early onset puberty associated with
boys with onset of home lower self-control and emotional
puberty instability, especially for boys
Early • Puberty: grow body • Growing capacity for • Struggle with sense of identity • Usually middle school
Adolescence hair, increase abstract thought • Feel awkward about one’s self and • Grades 6-8
perspiration and oil • Mostly interested in one’s body; • Learning primarily with own grade
Approximately production in hair present with limited • Increased conflict with parents level, although elective courses and
11-13 years of and skin thought of the future • Increased influence of peers extracurricular activities may be multi-
age • Tremendous physical • Intellectual interests • Desire for independence grade
growth in weight and expand and become • Tendency to return to childish behavior • More opportunities for autonomy and
height more important when stressed unstructured interactions
• Sexual interest • Deeper moral thinking • Moodiness • Less direct supervision than in
• Rule- and limit-testing elementary school
• Greater interest in privacy
Middle • Puberty is completed • Continued growth of • Intense self-involvement, changing • Usually high school
Adolescence • Physical growth capacity for abstract between high expectations and poor • Grades 9-12
slows for girls, thought self-concept • Learning with students in other grades
Approximately continues for boys • Greater capacity for • Continued adjustment to changing in many classes (i.e. a Spanish class
14-18 years of setting goals body, worries about being normal may have both 9th graders and 12th
age • Interest in moral • Tendency to distance selves from graders in it)
reasoning parents • Increasing interaction with students of
• Thinking about the • Continued drive for independence different grade levels
meaning of life • Driven to make friends and great • Reduced supervision than in lower
reliance on them grades
• Popularity can be important issue
• Feeling of love and passion

Adapted from the American Academy of Child and Adolescent’s Facts for Families, 2008
 Stages of Child & Adolescent Development

Adapted from the American Academy of Child and Adolescent’s Facts for Families, 2008