Question

Scavenger Hunt
Think about the three domains of development: biosocial or physical, cognitive and psychosocial and how they propel growth throughout our lives.
Choose only ONE stage of development: Infancy/Toddler (birth to 2 years); Early Childhood (3 to 6 years) or School Age (6 to 12 years).
Hunt for 2 items that promote the growth and development in each of the three domains: Biosocial, Cognitive and Psychosocial.
Justify/explain why you chose each item. Specify how it fosters development in the domain you have identified it is compatible to. Use small cards and type at least 3 skills that each item help to develop.
It is important that each chosen item it is age appropriate for the stage of development you identified and it is also appropriate for the domain of development.
Materials

• 6 safe, age and domain appropriate items.
• 6 index cards . Write at least 3 skills for each item that it will help to develop.
• 3 zip lock bags (optional) to keep items organized for each domain.
• 1 grocery bag (optional) to keep all items organized for this assignment.  
  
  Once you have identified your items, think critically about why they complement that stage of development and how they further development in the domain you have chosen.
  Write at least 3 skills that they promote for each domain: for example markers help development of the fine motor skills and eye and hand coordination, as well as writing.

Choose items in good repair and in a working condition. The standard is:" what would you like to receive as a gift on your birthday ?"

Write clear skills appropriate for each item. Identify the age group and the 2 items for each domain.

Answer 1

When used in relation to human development, the word "domain" refers to specific aspects of growth and change. The major domains of development are physical, cognitive, language, and social-emotional.

It might seem like a particular domain is the only one experiencing developmental change during a particular period of a child's life, but change typically occurs in the other domains as well—just more gradually and less prominently.

physical:-

The physical domain covers the development of physical changes, which includes growing in size and strength, as well as the development of both gross motor skills and fine motor skills.

The physical domain also includes the development of the senses and using them.

Physical development can be influenced by nutrition and illness. A healthy diet and regular wellness check-ups are key for proper child development.

Cognitive:-

The cognitive domain includes intellectual development and creativity.1 Kids gain the ability to process thoughts, pay attention, develop memories, understand their surroundings, express creativity, as well as to make, implement, and accomplish plans.

four stages of cognitive development:

The sensorimotor stage (birth to age 2)

The preoperational stage (age 2 to 7)

The concrete operational stage (age 7 to 11)

The formal operational stage (age 12 and up)

Psychosocial:-

The Psychosocial domain includes a child's growing understanding and control of their emotions.1 They also begin to identify what others are feeling, develop the ability to cooperate, show empathy, and use moral reasoning.

The child also begins to develop attachments to others and learns how to interact with them. Children and adolescents develop many relationships, from parents and siblings to peers, teachers, coaches, and others in the community.

Children develop self-knowledge during the Psychosocial stage. They learn how they identify with different groups and their innate temperament will also come into play in their relationships.

I select infancy period (birth to 2 years) to explain the domain development.

***Infant - newborn development**

Infant development is most often divided into the following areas:

(1)Cognitive

(2)Physical

Physical, such as fine motor skills (holding a spoon, pincer grasp) and gross motor skills (head control, sitting, and walking)

(3)Psychosocial

PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT

An infant's physical development begins at the head, then moves to other parts of the body. For example, sucking comes before sitting, which comes before walking.

Newborn to 2 months:

Can lift and turn their head when lying on their back

Hands are fisted, the arms are flexed

Neck is unable to support the head when the infant is pulled to a sitting position

Primitive reflexes include:

Babinski reflex, toes fan outward when sole of foot is stroked

Moro reflex (startle reflex), extends arms then bends and pulls them in toward body with a brief cry; often triggered by loud sounds or sudden movements

Palmar hand grasp, infant closes hand and "grips" your finger

Placing, leg extends when sole of foot is touched

Plantar grasp, infant flexes the toes and forefoot

Rooting and sucking, turns head in search of nipple when cheek is touched and begins to suck when nipple touches lips

Stepping and walking, takes brisk steps when both feet are placed on a surface, with body supported

Tonic neck response, left arm extends when infant gazes to the left, while right arm and leg flex inward, and vice versa

3 to 4 months:

Better eye-muscle control allows the infant to track objects.

Begins to control hand and feet actions, but these movements are not fine-tuned. The infant may begin to use both hands, working together, to accomplish tasks. The infant is still unable to coordinate the grasp, but swipes at objects to bring them closer.

Increased vision allows the infant to tell objects apart from backgrounds with very little contrast (such as a button on a blouse of the same color).

Infant raises up (upper torso, shoulders, and head) with arms when lying face down (on tummy).

Neck muscles are developed enough to allow the infant to sit with support, and keep head up.

Primitive reflexes have either already disappeared, or are starting to disappear.

5 to 6 months:

Able to sit alone, without support, for only moments at first, and then for up to 30 seconds or more.

Infant begins to grasp blocks or cubes using the ulnar-palmar grasp technique (pressing the block into palm of hand while flexing or bending wrist in) but does not yet use thumb.

Infant rolls from back to stomach. When on tummy, the infant can push up with arms to raise the shoulders and head and look around or reach for objects.

6 to 9 months:

Crawling may begin

Infant can walk while holding an adult's hand

Infant is able to sit steadily, without support, for long periods of time

Infant learns to sit down from a standing position

Infant may pull into and keep a standing position while holding onto furniture

9 to 12 months:

Infant begins to balance while standing alone

Infant takes steps holding a hand; may take few steps alone

SENSORY DEVELOPMENT

Hearing begins before birth, and is mature at birth. The infant prefers the human voice.

Touch, taste, and smell, mature at birth; prefers sweet taste.

Vision, the newborn infant can see within a range of 8 to 12 inches (20 to 30 centimeters). Color vision develops between 4 to 6 months. By 2 months, can track moving objects up to 180 degrees, and prefers faces.

Inner ear (vestibular) senses, the infant responds to rocking and changes of position.

LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

Crying is a very important way to communicate. By the baby's third day of life, mothers can tell their own baby's cry from that of other babies. By the first month of life, most parents can tell if their baby's cry means hunger, pain, or anger. Crying also causes a nursing mother's milk to letdown (fill the breast).

The amount of crying in the first 3 months varies in a healthy infant, from 1 to 3 hours a day. Infants who cry more than 3 hours a day are often described as having colic. Colic in infants is rarely due to a problem with the body. In most cases, it stops by 4 months of age.

Regardless of the cause, excessive crying needs a medical evaluation. It can cause family stress that can lead to child abuse.

0 to 2 months:

Alert to voices

Uses range of noises to signal needs, such as hunger or pain

2 to 4 months:

Coos

4 to 6 months:

Makes vowel sounds ("oo," "ah")

6 to 9 months:

Babbles

Blows bubbles ("raspberries")

Laughs

9 to 12 months:

Imitates some sounds

Says "Mama" and "Dada,", but not specifically for those parents

Responds to simple verbal commands, such as "no"

BEHAVIOR

Newborn behavior is based on six states of consciousness:

Active crying

Active sleep

Drowsy waking

Fussing

Quiet alert

Quiet sleep

Healthy babies with a normal nervous system can move smoothly from one state to another. Heart rate, breathing, muscle tone, and body movements are different in each state.

Many bodily functions are not stable in the first months after birth. This is normal and differs from infant to infant. Stress and stimulation can affect:

Bowel movements

Gagging

Hiccupping

Skin color

Temperature control

Vomitingbp

Yawning

Periodic breathing, in which breathing starts and stops again, is normal. It is not a sign of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Some infants will vomit or spit up after each feeding, but have nothing physically wrong with them. They continue to gain weight and develop normally.

Other infants grunt and groan while making a bowel movement, but produce soft, blood-free stools, and their growth and feeding are good. This is due to immature abdominal muscles used for pushing and does not need to be treated.

Sleep/wake cycles vary, and do not stabilize until a baby is 3 months old. These cycles occur in random intervals of 30 to 50 minutes at birth. Intervals gradually increase as the infant matures. By age 4 months, most infants will have one 5-hour period of uninterrupted sleep per day.

Breast-fed infants will feed about every 2 hours. Formula-fed infants should be able to go 3 hours between feedings. During periods of rapid growth, they may feed more often.

You do not need to give a baby water. In fact, it could be dangerous. An infant who is drinking enough will produce 6 to 8 wet diapers in a 24-hour period. Teaching the infant to suck a pacifier or their own thumb provides comfort between feedings.

The first skill of the social domain is social interest. This includes preferring human faces to inanimate objects, smiling at adults and returning the gaze of an adult, stretching arms to be picked up and seeking adults for play. A way that you, as a child care provider, can interact with them is to get down to the child’s eye level to show that you are cooperating in their play

The second skill of social domain is imitation. This includes imitating adult behaviour and taking part in pretend pay with simple scenarios, such as sweeping the floor. Interactions such a playing copy cat helps the child to learn through imitation. It’s also a reminder to us that the children around us are watching us, and a good indicator that we need to be role models.

The third skill is simple turn taking. This can be done through simple one-to-one games such the classic “peekaboo”. A game such as this can practices give and take of simple turn taking.

The last skill of social domain is maintaining connection across space. This includes using gesture, vocalizations and emerging expressive language t keep connected to an adult across space. This looks like keep eye contact with an infant so they can “check in” while exploring.

Domain: Psychosocial:-

We all want our children to have strong emotional intelligence to better understand themselves and to learn empathy for the people around them.

The first skill of the emotional domain is expression of emotion including comfort, discomfort, pleasure, displeasure, anger, anxiety, fear, sadness, joy and excitement. This expression can be show in the form of hugs, separation anxiety and showing clear attachment to parents. Self-regulation begins at this stage. As a child care provider, you can show your face or a comforting toy to help calm a child down.

To continue off of that point, the next skill of the emotional domain is self-regulation (our favourite topic!) Self-regulation is indicate by a child becoming calm when comforted by familiar adults, comforting self with thumb or recovering from distress and over-stimulation in a secure relationship. It is your responsibility as a child care provider to get to know the child’s self-soothing behaviours. For example, my nephew hates to be rocked to sleep but he needs his blanket in order to calm himself down. By responding to an infant’s distress, the child care provider can help the infant self-sooth.

The third skill is sense of self. This looks like sucking fingers, observing own hands, showing preference for being held by familiar people, beginning to distinguish known people from strangers, showing pleasure in mastery, playing confidently in the presence of caregiver and frequently checking in with them and increasing awareness of opportunities to make things happen yet limited understanding of consequences of own actions. A caregiver can hold the infant securely when meeting a new person to help them remain secure with new people and build confidence as the child expresses preference for certain people.

The fourth skill is empathy by noticing and responding to distress of others and offering comfort by touching. A caregiver who is responsive establishes the foundation of empathy.

The last skill is agency, beginning to sense that their behaviour can have an effect on others. Something as simple as smiling back at an infant who smiles at you is a way to response to their actions. This supports their sense that their behaviour can have an effect on others.

Domain: Cognitive

The first few years of a child’s life are pertinent in their development, especially for their cognitive growth.

The first skill is attention regulation. This means shifting attention with increasing ability and attending, disengaging and returning attention. A simple way a child care provider can do this is by reengaging the child in their play when they may look up and find something else to do.

The second skill is problem solving. This includes setting goals and acting to achieve them, solving problems with actions by trial and error, engaging others as agents in solving problems and beginning to use objects as tools for solving problems. A child care provider can provide praise and admiration to the infant for encouragement and positive reinforcement.

The third skill is cause-and-effect exploration such as repeating actions that produce outcomes, distinguishing actions from outcomes and using actions that show the properties and functions of things. The caregiver should show immediate responses to show the relationship between his actions and the reaction of the material.

The fourth is spatial exploration. This is indicated by tracking moving object with eyes, looking for dropped toys, elaborating search with watching and seeking after a number of changes. As well, identifying objects from different perspectives, using body to explore space by crawling in, by and through various objects and exploring objects in space by dropping toys into containers and dumping them out. An example of what a child care provider can do is asking “where is the doggy?” and shrugging shoulders. This encourages the child to read your body language and search around them.

The fifth is spatial problem-solving. This is shown through persisting in search for hidden toy, searching for toy that rolled under furniture by crawling around to the other side, solving spatial problems involving barriers by moving over, around or through barriers, and stacking blocks. An activity a child care provider can do is use a cushion to create a new barrier on the floor to create a new spatial problem for the crawling infant to master.

The sixth is object permanence, or searching for playthings that move out of sight and finding hidden objects. A game for object permanence would be to hide the child’s favourite toy under a small blanket while while they’re watching. Pause. Lift the blanket and look surprised. This simple game teaches a child rules of a game and object permanence.

The seventh is symbolic thought, representation and root skills of literacy. This is indicated by creating internal image of an absent object or past event, using gestures and materials to stand for ideas, pointing to photos, pictures in books and imitating adult actions. Take a family picture and point to each family member and say their name. This helps the child represent real things and that things and pictures have names.

The eight is memory and sorting. This is indicated through recognizing previously seen faces and objects, increasing capacity of recognition memory and grouping like objects together. The idea is to point to play material and touch them and sort the play material out into groups, such as coloured building blocks.

Domain: Physical

Infants change everyday and it is very evident in their little growing bodies. These are indicated in four different skill areas.

The first skill is gross motor (larger muscles). This includes reaching and holding, releasing objects, holding head up, lifting upper body, rolling, sitting, crawling, pulling self to stand up, cruising, walking, strength and coordination. As a child care provider, it is your responsibility to provide toys and activities that can strengthen the infant. Activities include placing objects around them just out of reach of them so they have to move to them, holding their hands to help them walk around and providing push toys so they can walk around with them.

The second is fine motor (smaller muscles). This includes palmar grasp, coordination, pincer grasp and holding and using tools. Offer the infant toys to hold onto of all sizes, encouraging eating with fingers foods of all (safe) sizes and scribbling with crayons.

The third is senses. This includes visual, auditory, touch, olfactory and taste. Use the space around to explore the different senses. For example, have soft toys, hard toys, roll a ball around for the infant to follow with their eyes, listen to music, bang on pots and pans, and try new foods! Everyday interactions with our environment helps the infant’s senses grow!