CHAPTER 7

Physical and Cognitive

Development in Early
Childhood
 Chapter Outline
• Physical changes
• Cognitive changes
• Language development
• Early childhood education

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 Physical Changes
• Body growth and change
• Motor development
• Sleep
• Nutrition and exercise
• Illness and death

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 Body Growth and Change
• Height and weight
– Average growth is 2.5 inches and 5 to 10 pounds per year
during early childhood
– Growth patterns vary individually
– Two most important contributors to height differences
• Ethnic origin and nutrition
– Growth hormone deficiency: Absence of growth hormone
produced by the pituitary gland to stimulate the body to
grow

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 Body Growth and Change
• The brain
– Brain growth slows during early childhood
• Brain reaches 95% of adult volume by 6 years
• Changes in child’s brain structure
– Myelination: Nerve cells are covered and insulated with a
layer of fat cells
• Increases the speed at which information travels through the
nervous system
– Rapid, distinct spurts of growth especially in the frontal
lobes

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 A Myelinated Nerve Fiber

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 Motor Development
• Most preschool children are more active than
they will ever be at any later period in the life
span
• Gross motor skills
– Simple movements at age 3
– More adventurous at age 4
– Hair-raising risks at age 5

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 Motor Development
• Fine motor skills
– Still clumsy at 3 years
– Improved fine motor coordination at 4 years
– Body coordination by 5 years

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 Motor Development
• Perceptual development
– Age 3-4 years - Detection of boundaries between
colors
– Age 4-5 years - Children can focus their eyes and
sustain their attention effectively on close-up
objects

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 Sleep
• Recommended sleep - 11-13 hours each night
without interruption
• Disorders - Narcolepsy, insomnia, and nightmares
• Sleep problems and negative outcomes
– Attention problems
– Worse school readiness
• more so with increased screen time
– Being overweight
– Social problems

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 Nutrition and Exercise
• Overweight young children
– Serious health problems in early childhood
– Strongly influenced by caregivers’ behavior
– Categories for obesity, overweight, and at risk for
being overweight
• Determined by body mass index (BMI)
– U.S. has second highest rate of childhood obesity

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 Nutrition and Exercise
• Malnutrition in young children from low-
income families
– 11 million preschool children are experiencing
malnutrition
– Biggest problem is iron deficiency anemia
• Exercise should be a daily occurrence

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 Illness and Death
• The United States
– Leading causes of death in U.S. children are:
• Accidents (unintentional injuries)
• Congenital malformations
• Deformations
• Chromosomal abnormalities
– Children’s safety
– Environmental tobacco smoke

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 Illness and Death
• State of illness and health of the world’s
children
– Devastating effects of health occur in countries
with high poverty rates
– Dramatic increase in deaths due to HIV/AIDS,
especially in poor countries

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 Cognitive Changes
• Piaget’s preoperational stage
• Vygotsky’s theory
• Information processing

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 Piaget’s Preoperational Stage
• Preoperational stage
– Piaget’s second stage
– Ages 2 to 7 years
– Children represent the world with words, images,
and drawings
• Form stable concepts and begin to reason
• Cognitions are dominated by egocentrism and magical
beliefs

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 Piaget’s Preoperational Stage
• Operations: Reversible mental actions that allow
children to do mentally what they formerly did
physically
• Symbolic function substage: Child gains the ability to
mentally represent an object that is not present
– Egocentrism: Inability to distinguish one’s own perspective
from someone else’s
– Animism: Belief that inanimate objects have lifelike
qualities and are capable of action

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 The Three Mountains Task

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 Piaget’s Preoperational Stage
• Intuitive thought substage: Children use primitive
reasoning and want to know the answers to
questions
– Ages 4-7 years
• Centration and the limits of preoperational thought
– Centration: Centering attention on one characteristic to
the exclusion of all others
– Conservation: Altering a substance’s appearance does not
change its basic properties

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 Piaget’s Conservation Task

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 Some Dimensions of Conservation:
Number, Matter, and Length

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 Vygotsky’s Theory
• Children think and understand primarily
through social interaction
• Zone of proximal development (ZPD): Range of
tasks that are too difficult for the child alone
but that can be learned with guidance
• Scaffolding - Changing the level of support

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 Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal
Development

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 Vygotsky’s Theory
• Language and thought
– Children use speech to communicate socially and
to help them solve tasks
– Private speech - Use of language for self-
regulation
– Inner speech becomes their thoughts
– More private speech = more social competence

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 Vygotsky’s Theory
• Teaching strategies - Vygotsky’s theory can be
applied to education
– Assess child’s ZPD
– Use the child’s ZPD in teaching
– Use more-skilled peers as teachers
– Place instruction in a meaningful context
– Transform the classroom with Vygotskian ideas

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 Vygotsky’s Theory
• Evaluating Vygotsky’s theory
– Social constructivist approach: Emphasizes social
contexts of learning and asserts that knowledge is
mutually built and constructed through social
interaction
– Criticism
• Not specific enough about age-related changes
• Does not describe how changes in socioemotional
capabilities contribute to cognitive development
• Overemphasized the role of language in thinking

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 Comparison of Vygotsky’s and
Piaget’s Theories

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 Information Processing
• Attention - Focusing of mental resources on
select information
– Executive attention
• Action planning
• Allocating attention to goals
• Error detection and compensation
• Monitoring progress on tasks
• Dealing with difficult circumstances

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 Information Processing
– Sustained attention: Focused and extended
engagement with object, task, event, or other
aspect of the environment
– Deficiencies in attention
• Salient versus relevant dimensions
• Planfulness

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 Information Processing
• Memory - Retention of information over time
– Short-term: Individuals can retain information up
to 30 seconds with no rehearsal
– Assessing short-term memory - Memory-span task

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 Developmental Changes in Memory Span

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 Information Processing
• How accurate are young children’s long-term
memories?
– There are age differences in children’s susceptibility to
suggestion
– There are individual differences in susceptibility
– Interviewing techniques can produce substantial
distortions in children’s reports about highly salient events
• Ultimately accuracy of the testimony is dependent on
type, number, an intensity of the suggestive
techniques experienced

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 Information Processing
• Autobiographical memory:
– Involves memory of significant events and
experiences in one’s life
• In some areas (remembering a story, more, a song or
interesting event or experience), young children have
been shown to have reasonably good memories

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 Information Processing
• Executive functioning: Umbrella-like concept
that consists of higher-level cognitive
processes linked to the development of the
brain’s prefrontal cortex
– Managing one’s thoughts to engage in goal
directed behavior and self-control

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 Information Processing
• Theory of mind: Awareness of one’s own
mental process and the mental processes of
others
– Developmental changes
• Age 18 months–3 years - Children begin to
understand three mental states
– Perceptions, desires, and emotions

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 Information Processing
• Age 3 to 5 years - Children understand false
beliefs
• Age 5 to 9 years - Appreciation of the mind
• Age 7+ years - Understand the beliefs and
thoughts of others
– Individual differences
• Executive function

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 Developmental Changes in False-
Belief Performance

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 Language Development
• Understanding phonology and morphology
• Changes in syntax and semantics
• Advances in pragmatics
• Young children’s literacy

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 Understanding Phonology and
Morphology
• During preschool years, children:
– Become sensitive to the sounds of spoken words
– Produce all the sounds of their language
– Demonstrate a knowledge of morphology rules
• Use plurals, possessives, prepositions, articles, and verb
forms

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 Stimuli in Berko’s Study of Young Children’s
Understanding of Morphological Rules

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 Changes in Syntax and Semantics
• Fast mapping: Process that helps to explain how
young children learn the connection between a word
and its referent so quickly
• Learn and apply rules of syntax
• Children learn the words:
– They hear most often
– For things and events that interest them
– Better in responsive and interactive contexts than in
passive contexts

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 Changes in Syntax and Semantics
– Best in contexts that are meaningful
– Best when they access clear information about
word meaning
– Best when grammar and vocabulary are
considered

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 Advances in Pragmatics
• Adapt their speech in different settings
• Young children’s literacy
– Positive orientation toward reading and writing
must be developed
– Importance of early language skills
• Phonological awareness
• Readiness for school
• Reading achievement in high school

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 Young Children’s Literacy
• Books can be valuable tool
– Use books to initiate conversation
– Use what and why questions
– Encourage children to ask questions about stories
– Choose some books that play with lanugage

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 Early Childhood Education
• Variations in early childhood education
• Education for young children who are
disadvantaged
• Controversies in early childhood education

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 Variations in Early Childhood
Education
• Child-centered kindergarten: Education of the
whole child and concern for his or her
physical, cognitive, and socioemotional
development
• Montessori approach: Child is given freedom
and spontaneity in choosing activities

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 Variations in Early Childhood
Education
• Developmentally appropriate and
inappropriate education
– Developmentally appropriate practice (DAP):
Typical developmental patterns of children and
the uniqueness of each child

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 Early Childhood Education
• Education for young children who are disadvantaged
– Project Head Start: Compensatory program designed to
provide children from low-income families:
• Opportunity to acquire the skills and experiences important for
success in school
– Controversies in early childhood education
• Curriculum controversy
• Universal preschool education

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