UNIT 1 BASIC CONCEPTS AND ISSUES ON HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

~Ken Robinson
“You cannot predict the outcome of human development. All You Can do is like a farmer creates the conditions under which it will begin to flourish.”

Growth:
- The progressive increase and continuous advancement of the child from birth to maturity.
-Refers to the increment of bodily tissues, organs, and structures
Involves structural and functional changes

Development:
-The gradual and orderly unfolding of the characteristics of the successive stages of growth involving the emerging and expanding of the individual to provide greater
facility in functioning.
-By orderly it means that the changes follow a logical sequence, with each paving the way for future changes and making sense in the light of what went before.
It involves:
Qualitative changes- mean a fundamental transformation in a child’s abilities or characteristics over time.
Quantitative changes- means increase in the amount of the ability or characteristics a child already has (existing ability).

Historical Roots of Human Development

Plato – A person is born with innate ideas and with pre-existing knowledge
John Locke – Children have natural interest which should be curbed due to the fact that man had a sinful nature. He formulated the “Tabula rasa”.
Jean Jacques Rousseau – Human development unfolds naturally in positive ways as long as society allows it to do so.
John Dewey – People “learn by doing.” Self-realization and self-expression are children’s rights.
Henry Goddard – Placement of bright children in a special class so that their alert minds can be kept properly occupied.
G. Stanley Hall – Adolescence is a period of storm and stress. These results from the rapid physiological changes occurring at pubescence.

Methods used to Study Children

• Naturalistic Observation – Observing the recording children’s behavior in a real-life setting without manipulating the environment or altering certain behavior.
• Case Study – The past and present life of the individual are studied to guide remedial treatment. The date includes family and social background, physical health,
emotional, and educational development, interests, habits, and various activities that the individual engages in.
• Interview Method – A technique for obtaining information by asking about a subject’s opinions, behaviors, and attitudes.
• Survey Method – A way to obtain information by asking many individuals a set of questions about a particular subjects of events.
• Experimental Method – A method for identifying cause-and-effect relationship.
• Psychometric Method – Standardized test are given to subjects under study to measure one type of ability or an inspect of his development.

Views of Human Development

There are many approaches to understanding the person at various portions of his life.
• The Psychological view – this approach emphasizes how people of a particular age group perform on a specific task
• The Developmental view – this approach emphasizes the history of the person.
• The Lifespan view – this approach conceptualizes human behavior as influenced by developmental processes across biological, historical, sociocultural, and
psychological factors from conception to death (Lerner, 2002)
The Lifespan View
- German Psychologist Paul Baltes develop the lifespan perspective. This approach is base on several key principles:

• Developmental is lifelong. Development is not completed in infancy or childhood or at any specific age; it encloses the entire lifespan, from conception to death.

• Developmental is multidimensional. This means that a complex interplay of factors influence development across the lifespan, including biological, cognitive, and
socioemotional changes. The interaction of these factors is what influences an individual’s development.

• Developmental is multidirectional. This means that a particular domain does not occur in a strictly linear fashion but that development of certain traits can be
characterized as having the capacity for both an increase and decrease in efficacy over the course of an individual’s life.

• Developmental is plastic. This refers to intrapersonal variation and emphasizes more on the potentials and boundaries of human development. The idea of plasticity
emphasizes the fact that there are many potential development outcomes and that human development is far more open and pluralistic than what traditional idea
dictates.

• Developmental is contextual. This refers to the idea that the three systems of biological and environmental influences work together to influence development.
Development occurs in context and varies from person to person, depending on factors such as a person’s biology, family, school, church, profession, nationality, and
ethnicity.

3 Types of Influences (Baltes):

a. Normative age-graded influences – are those biological and environmental factors that have a strong connection with age
b. Normative history-graded influences – associated with a specific time period in which the individual born and grow.
c. Non-normative influences – are the unique experiences of an individual, whether biological or environmental, that shape the development process.

• Development is multidisciplinary. Any single discipline’s account of development across the lifespan would not be able to express all aspects of this theoretical
framework. In order to understand development, a collaboration among psychologists, sociologists, neuroscientists, anthropologists, educators, economists, historians,
medical researchers, and other researchers should be sought.

Educational Implications:
Knowledge about the principles of development is important for 3 reasons:
• It helps both teachers and parents to know what to expect. Otherwise, there would be a tendency to expect too much or too little of the child at a given time.
• It gives the adult information as to when to stimulate and not to stimulate the child.
• It makes possible for parents, teachers, and others to work with the children to prepare the child ahead of time for the changes that will take place in his body, his
interests, or his behavior.

FACTORS INFLUENCING GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT

• HEREDITY – is the process by which the new organism is endowed with certain potentials (inherited from the parents) for his/her later development.
Ex. hormones, gender
MATURATION is the process by which heredity exerts influence long after birth.
• ENVIRONMENT – are all the external factors influencing the life and activities of the individual.
Ex. Food, exercise, play, home
 Exceptional Children
• Areas of Exceptionality:
1. Sensory impairments – visually handicapped or the hearing impared
2. Physically handicapped – crippled, impairment of the nerves and muscles
3. Behavioral disabilities – Autism, ADHD, aggressive behavior, disruptive behavior
4. Mental retardation
5. The mentally superior or the Gifted

Developmental Stages and Tasks during the Lifespan

Developmental Task – are any of the fundamental physical, social, intellectual, and emotional achievements and abilities that must be acquired at each stage of life for
normal and healthy development.
Because development is largely cumulative, the inability to master and developmental tasks at one stage is likely to inhibit development in later stages.
Developmental Tasks Serve Three Purposes
• They are the guidelines that enable individuals to know what society expects of them at given ages.
• Developmental tasks motivate individuals to do what the social group expects them to do at a certain ages during their lives.
• Developmental tasks show individuals that lies ahead and what they will be expected to do when they reach their stage of development.

HAVIGHURST’S DEVELOPMENTAL TASKS

-Robert Havighurst conceptualize human development as a mastery of a series of age-related cultural tasks.
INFANCY AND EARLY CHILDHOOD (0-5) MIDDLE AND LATE CHILDHOOD (6-12) EARLY ADULTHOOD (19-29)
• Learning to take solid foods • Building physical skills necessary for ordinary games • Selecting a mate
• Learning to walk • Building a wholesome attitude toward oneself as a growing • Learning to live with a partner
• Learning to talk learning to control the elimination of body wastes organism • Starting a family
• Learning sex differences and sexual modesty • Learning to get along with age mates • Rearing children
• Getting ready to read • Beginning to develop appropriate masculine or feminine social • Managing a home
• Learning to distinguish right and wrong and beginning to develop roles • Starting an occupation
a conscience • Developing fundamental skills in reading, writing and calculating • Assuming civic responsibility
(According to Freud, the superego should be present during • Developing concepts necessary for everyday living
this time because it is the foundation of the child’s morality • Developing attitudes toward social groups and institutions
later in life) • Achieving personal independence
ADOLESCENSE (13-18) MIDDLE ADULTHOOD (30-60)
• Achieving new and more mature relations with the age mates or both sexes. • Helping teenage children to become happy and
• Achieving a masculine or feminine social role responsible
• Accepting one’s physique and using one’s body effectively • Achieving adult social and civic responsibility
• Desiring accepting, and achieving socially responsible behavior • Satisfactory career achievement
• Achieving emotional independence from parents and other adults • Developing adult leisure time activities
• Preparing for an economic career • Relating to one’s spouse as a person
• Preparing for marriage and family life • Accepting the physiological changes of middle age
• Acquiring a set values and an ethical system as a guide to behavior- • Adjusting to aging parent
developing an ideology
Gross Motor Skills - refer to controlling large parts of the body; arms and legs. Fine motor skills refer to coordinating small body parts, hands and
fingers. Involve movement of the larger muscle groups, like the arms and legs. It's these larger muscle groups that allow babies to sit up, turn over,
crawl, and walk.
- Some of the baby activities would include:
Randomly move arms and legs.
Put hands near eyes and touch mouth.
Be able to lift his/her head up when on stomach.
Be able to put weight on arms when on stomach.
Move head from side to side while lying on back.
Hold head steady when held in sitting position.
Sit with little support at the waist

Fine Motor Skills

The ability to exhibit fine motor skills involves activities that involve precise eye-hand coordination. The development of reaching and grasping
becomes more refined during the first two years of life. Initially, infants display only unrefined motions of the shoulder and elbow, but later they show
movements of the wrist, hand rotation, and thumb and forefinger coordination.

Parenting/Caregiving Skills for Toddlers

Parents and children should enjoy doing these activities together for this will promote not only physical well-being but emotional as well:

✓ Provide an atmosphere for play that provides plenty of time and room for productive activities

✓ Stretch out parts of the body. Stretch the toes, feet, thighs, arms, and fingers and gently wiggle them.

✓ Play games that involve running, hopping, throwing and catching together

✓ Ask the kid to use alternate feet for kicking or alternate hands for batting while playing ball.

✓ Discourage inactivity by limiting the playability of television and video/computer games to less than two hours a day
✔ Invite children to help with small household chores.

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT OF INFANTS AND TODDLERS

Sensorimotor Stage

Characterized by:

- Absence of language
- Learning is based on sense perception
- Children are egocentric
- Acquisition of object permanence - the realization that objects go on existing even when they are not experiencing them.

Piaget suggested "assimilation and accommodation" as the two principles underlie the growth in children's schemes:

Assimilation on one hand is the process of incorporating object or experience into present strategies or concepts.

Accommodation on the other hand is a process of creating a new scheme by modifying an existing scheme after an individual's interaction with the
environment.

Language Development/Language Acquisition Theories

The Nativist Theory of Language Acquisition Device (LAD) develop by Noam Chomsky, a noted linguist who believes that humans have an innate
Language Acquisition Device - a theory which argues that we are all born with an innate understanding of the way language works. Just as the heart is
programmed to pump blood, the LAD is also preprogrammed to learn language, and the fact that children everywhere acquire language the same way,
and without much effort, seems to indicate that we're born wired with the basics already present in our brains.

The Socio-cultural Theory also known as the interactionist approach, takes concepts from both biology and sociology to interpret our language
acquisition. This theory of language learning states that children will acquire language out of a desire to engage with their surrounding environment.
Language is therefore based on social contact and arises from it. The theory suggests that our language depends on whom and what we hang around and
with whom we want to connect, so our language evolves out of a desire to communicate.

The Learning Theory is a theory of language acquisition that looks at language learning as learning a new ability and that language is learned in much
the same way as how to count or how to tie shoes by repetition and reinforcement. Parents praise babies for "talking" when they give a babble sound.
When children grow up, they are frequently praised for speaking properly and punished when they don't. The learning theory that language comes from
stimulus and stimulus-response originates from this correction and praise.

SOCIO-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF INFANTS AND TODDLERS

Attachment

John Bowlby, the proponent of the Attachment theory defined attachment as the lasting psychological connectedness between human beings (Bowlby,
1969).

Facts about attachment:

✓ The child's relationship with the mother or primary caregiver is very significant in terms of their social, emotional and cognitive development. That,
there is a connection between early childhood separations with the mother and subsequent maladjustment.

✓ The key theme of attachment theory is that primary caregivers who are accessible and attentive to the needs of an infant help the child to build a sense
of protection.

✓ Bowlby regarded attachment as a result of processes of evolution. While the behavioral attachment theories indicated that attachment was a learned
mechanism, Bowlby and others suggested that children were born with an intrinsic drive to shape attachments with caregivers.

✓ What is central to baby's emotional well-being is not about "who feeds him," and who provides nourishment because Bowlby observed that feeding
alone did not lessen the anxiety experienced by children when they were separated from their primary caregivers.
✓ Separation anxiety is a form of anxiety experienced by a young child and caused by separation from a significant - nurturing figure.

Facts About Preschoolers Development

· There is a slower pattern of growth during early childhood as compared to the rapid increase in body size that took place in infancy.

· By the end of the early childhood stage, children started to lose their "baby teeth."

· Physical coordination and balance, perception, attention, and imagination improve due to continues synaptic pruning of neural fibers in the brain

Gross and Fine Motor Development

Gross Motor Development - refers to acquiring skills that involve large muscles. These skills are categorized into;

a. Locomotor skills; are those skills that involve going from one place to another like walking, running, and climbing.

b. Non-locomotor skills; are those skills where movement is stationary like bending, turning, and swaying.

c. Manipulative skills; are those that involve throwing and receiving of objects like ball throwing, striking, and catching.

Fine Motor Development - refers to acquiring the ability to use smaller muscles in the arm, hands and fingers purposely.

Activities include: picking, squeezing, pounding, zipping and combing hair.

Preschoolers Artistic Development

Viktor Lowenfeld studied this early childhood artistry and came up with this stages of drawing

Scribbling stage - the drawing begins with large

LIMITATION OF PREOPERATIONAL THOUGHT (2 – 7 Y.O.)
Egocentrism when children begin to represent the world mentally, they are unaware of any other perspective other than their own.
Animistic thinking - the belief that inanimate objects have lifelike qualities such as thoughts, emotions, feelings and intentions, the same way as
they felt.
Inability to conserve
Conservation - refers to the idea that certain physical characteristics of objects remain the same even when their outward appearance changes.
- Preoperational children's understanding is "centered," or characterized by centration wherein children focus on only one aspect of the situation
neglecting other important features.
- Children's thinking is also perception-bound. They are easily distracted by the appearance of objects.
Irreversibility - the child's failure to understand that an operation can go in two or more directions. They understand that 2+3=5, but cannot understand
that 5-3=2 
Transductive Reasoning - errors in inferring cause and effect relationships.

PIAGET'S Theory and Education

Preschool teachers must be guided with these three educational principles

1. An emphasis on discovery learning.

Teachers must provide a rich variety of materials and play areas. Children explore through environmental interactions - art puzzles, table games, physical
hygiene corner, building blocks, reading corner, gardening and more.

2. Sensitivity to children's readiness to learn.

Teachers should watch and listen to their pupil, introduce experiences that would permit them to correct their incorrect ways of viewing the world. Teachers and
parents should not impose new skills before children show they are interested and ready for the next scheme.
3. Acceptance of individual differences.

Teachers should plan activities for individual children or small groups rather than activities for the whole class. In addition, teachers should compare and evaluate
educational progress to the child's own previous development rather than comparing the progress to his/her classmate's progress.

PSYCHOSOCIAL DEVELOPMENT OF PRESCHOOLERS

Big Ideas on Preschooler's Socio-emotional Development

✓ The development of initiative is crucial to the preschooler.

✓ A healthy self-concept is needed for preschoolers to interact with others.

✓ Preschooler's social development is shown through the stages of play.

✓ The care-giving styles of parents and teachers affect the preschooler's socio-emotional development

✓ Preschoolers are interested in building friendship.

Erikson's Theory

Initiative - the tendency of children to want to take action and assert themselves.

Judicious permissiveness involves setting realistic boundaries that keep preschoolers safe and respectful of self and others.

Self-concept- the set of attributes, abilities, attitudes, values, strengths and weaknesses that an individual believes defines who he/she is.

Self-esteem - refers to the individual's judgment of his/her worth

 Parenting/ Caregiving Styles
The style of parenting/caregiving affects the socio-emotional development of the children. Diana Baumrind, a developmental psychologist at the University of
California at Berkeley noticed that preschoolers exhibited distinctly different types of behavior. Each type of behavior was highly correlated to a specific kind of
parenting. She narrated that there is a close relationship between the types of parenting style and children's behavior. Different style can lead to different child
development and child outcomes. Based on observations and interviews, she identified varying degrees of demandingness and responsiveness as determinants
of the four parenting/caregiving styles.
Responsiveness refers to how warm, caring and respectful the adult to the child. It involves openness in communication and the willingness to explain things in
ways that the child will understand.
Demandingness refers to the level of control and expectations. This involves discipline and confrontation strategies.

Authoritative Permissive
Baumrind's Parenting/Caregiving Styles and their Effects on Children Permissive Style (Low demandingness, high responsiveness)
Authoritative Style (High demandingness, high responsiveness) Description:
Description: They have very few demands to make of their children.
Much more democratic They are non-traditional and lenient
Expect behavior appropriate to the age of the child Do not set rules
Maintain reasonable and fair limits Do not demand good behavior or task accomplishment Think that they lack
Closely monitor the activities of the child confidence to influence the child Has little commitment to their roles as parents
Have realistic expectations of the child Shows undemanding, indifferent and rejecting action vards the child
Discipline approach focuses more on teaching than punishing.  Parents may be overburdened by many concerns in life
Their disciplinary methods are supportive, rather than punitive Generally nurturing and communicative with their children
Parents often take the status of a friend more than that of a parent.
Effects on Children:
Teaches the child to take responsibility  Effects on Children:
Builds the child's capacity for empathy  Children tend to be demanding and dependent
Makes the child feel safe and secure Children has inadequate emotional control

Authoritarian Neglectful
Authoritarian Style (High demandingness, low responsiveness) Uninvolved/Negligent (Low demandingness, low responsiveness)
Description: Description:
Established psychological control over the child Characterized by few demands and little communication.
Use corporal punishment, sarcasm, threats and withdrawal of love While these parents fulfill the child's basic needs, they are enerally detached
Failed to explain the reasoning behind the rules being set They are from their child's life.
obedience and status oriented, and expects their orders
 DEVELOPMENT OF THE SCHOOL LEARNERS
PHYSICAL, COGNITIVE, AND SOCIO-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF MIDDLE/LATE CHILDHOOD
(THE ELEMENTARY YEARS)

Physical development of Middle Childhood (6-8 years old) Physical development of Late Childhood (9-12 years old)
Motor Development
Flexibility; children are more pliant and elastic. This can be seen as children swing a bat, kick a ball, jump over a hurdle, and execute tumbling routines.
Balance; improved balance supports advances in many athletic skills. Running, hopping, skipping, throwing, kicking, and changes in direction required in many
team sports are among them.
Agility; is the ability to move quickly and easily. Quickness and accuracy in movements like dodging opponents in tag and soccer, and footwork in basketball
shows agility of children.
Force; it is evident that older middle age children can throw and kick a ball harder and propel themselves father when running and jumping as compared to their
earlier days.
Middle and Late Childhood
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
The Concrete Operational Stage
The concrete operational stage is the third stage in Piaget's theory of cognitive development.
This period spans the years from 7 - 12 years of age. This period is characterized by more logical thoughts, flexible, and organized than it was during early
childhood.
Piaget considered the concrete stage a major turning point in the child's cognitive development, because it marks the beginning of logical or operational thought.
The child is now mature enough to use logical thought or operations (i.e. rules) but can only apply logic to physical objects (hence concrete operational).

Middle childhood children are now capable of the following:

Conservation
It is the understanding something stays the same in quantity even though its appearance changes. It is the ability to
understand that rearranging and redistributing materials does not affect its mass, number, area, or volume.
By 7 years old, children can conserve liquid because they understand that when water is poured into a different shaped
glass, the quantity of liquid remains the same, even though its appearance has changed. Conservation number develops
soon after.
Classification
- Classification is the ability to identify the properties of categories, to relate categories or classes to one another, and to use categorical information to solve problems.
- One component of classification skills is the ability to group objects according to some dimension that they share. The other ability is to order subgroups hierarchically,
so that each new grouping will include all previous subgroups. For example, a child is shown four red flowers and two white ones and is asked 'are there more red
flowers or more flowers?' A typical five year old would say 'more red ones'.
- Piaget stated that the child focuses on one aspect, either class or sub-class. It is not until he can decenter that he
can simultaneously compare both the whole and the parts, which make up the whole. The child can then understand
the relationship between class and sub-class.
Reversibility
- An awareness that actions can be reversed.
- Children are able to reverse the order of relationships between mental categories. For example, in Arithmetic,
3+4=7 and 7-4-3. Another example is relationship. The teacher asks, "Jacob, do you have a brother?" Jacob answered, "Yes." "What's his name?" asks the teacher.
"Matthew," replied Jacob. The teacher again asks, "Does Matthew have a brother?" "Yes," Jacob answered.
Seriation
- The ability to mentally arrange items along a quantifiable dimension, such as height or weight.
Decentration
- When it comes to volume, a child learns that a change in one aspect of the water (its height) is compensated for by a change in another aspect (its width)

Erik Erikson's Psychosocial Theory of Development

Industry means developing competence at useful skills and tasks. Children become aware of their capacities, develop a sense of moral commitment, and
responsibility. Children who are encouraged and commended by parents and teachers develop a feeling of competence and belief in their abilities. Those who
receive little or no encouragement from parents, teachers, or peers will doubt their ability to be Successful, hence inferiority sets in.
Inferiority is reflected in the sad pessimism of children who have little confidence in their ability to do things well. Children who struggle with schoolwork may
have a harder time developing these feelings of sureness. Instead, they may be left with feelings of inadequacy and inferiority .

DEVELOPMENT OF THE SCHOOL LEARNERS

PHYSICAL, COGNITIVE, AND SOCIO-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF ADOLESCENTS
(THE HIGH SCHOOL LEARNERS)
ADOLESCENCE
- is the transition period between childhood and adulthood. - occurs between the ages of 10 - 19 years old.
- a culturally constructed period that begins as a person reach sexual maturity and ends when he/she established an identity as an adult.
- the physical changes by which adolescents reach sexual maturity and is capable of reproduction is called puberty.

1. Based on the topic about reversibility as part of the cognitive development of middle childhood wherein Jacob was asked by his teacher about his brother, based on
his answer, is he capable of reversibility? Explain your answer.
Yes, he is capable of reversibility because Jacob is now mature enough to use reversible thinking. He is already aware that actions can be reversed. And with that, he'll
be able to think things from one perspective and also the opposite perspective.

2. Why is there an increase in disputes/conflict between parent and child during the adolescent period?
Because adolescent period is the pivotal point in the life of individual. This is the point of life where a child is beginning the transition into adulthood. And sometimes
parents may fail to understand what's going on in the life of adolescent, that's why conflict may arise between parents and the youngsters. The young child at this period
is already establishing an identity as an adult and wants greater freedom and frequently misbehaves to get what they want.

3. Explain the parents and teacher's roles in the socio-emotional development of the adolescents.
The parents and teacher's role in the socio-emotional development of the adolescents is to help solidify the identity formation of adolescent. Adolescence is a time of
discovering one's own identity. That is to say the outcomes for this stage are either an “identity” or “role confusion.” A parent or teacher may use this information to help
recognize an adolescent whose transition may appear to be stalled in role confusion and assist them in seeking ways to carve out and create their identity and self-
worth.

4. Have you noticed sometimes adolescent's thinking and behavior seems quite mature, but at other times they seem to behave or think in illogical, impulsive or
emotional ways? How will you attribute this behavior to the continued "pruning" of the brain?
Yes, this is because there is a remarkable change in the adolescent's thinking pattern during this time of development. Adolescence begin to think of new possibilities
and considered abstract concepts such as love, fear, and freedom as they have this sense of invincibility. So some of the teenagers doesn’t think of the consequences
of their actions.
And uring the pruning process, the prefrontal cortex here which is located at the front part of the brain is remodeled, this part of the brain (the frontal lobe) is responsible
for planning, thinking, decision-making, and problem solving and control of impulses.

Because the prefrontal cortex is still in the process of being remodeled, the adolescence way of thinking is not yet concrete. The adolescent brain is not yet fully
developed so the they still rely on the part of the brain called amygdala, so the amygdala make decisions and solve problems. The amygdala is associated with
emotions impulses aggression and instinctive behavior, which greatly explains the adolescent's demeanor.
It is the Amygdala which is responsible for our instinctive behaviour that is why, we cannot rely on the decision making of adolescents.