Child Development Reflection

I need to produce results of an investigation into the development of a child in a care setting. The care setting that I have chosen is a nursery. I was working in nursery for 2 weeks. The investigation is about the child that I have chosen and I gave her a nick name of S in my assignment.

I consider the child’s physical, intellectual, emotional and social development.

I wrote about a summary of the identified influences on the development of the child, a description of the care services that are been provided to the child, information of the development of the child and information on the relevant legal requirements for the child.

I maintained confidentiality throughout my assignment. I got permission from my placement manager and the child’s parent before writing any information on the child.

The child that I have chosen is four years of age and she is quite capable and independent. She walks almost like an adult, and likes to hop and jump. She asks a lot of questions like about the way things work in the world. Her height is one meter and her weight is 14 kilogram.

Gross motor skills: she has developed a good sense of balance and is able to walk along a line. She can stand, walk and run on tiptoe. Also she can catch, kick, throw and bounce a ball. She bends at the waist to pick up objects from the floor and also she runs up and down stairs, one foot per step.

Fine motor skills: she can build a tower of ten or more cubes. Also she can copy a building pattern of three steps using six cubes or more. She can hold and use a pencil like an adult. She can draw a figure that represents a person showing head, hands, legs and body. She is also able to spread her hands, and can bring her thumbs into opposition with each finger in turn.

Her intellectual development is good. She can match and name almost all of the colours and she listens to long stories with attention. She counting up to twenty by rote.

She talks about things in the past and the future. Her memory skills are good. For example, she can remember that her grandparents visited several months previously.

She can gives reasons and solve problems. She is always asking questions by using why? When? How? And understanding the answers. She can repeat nursery rhymes and songs, with very few errors. She can state her full name and her parents and sisters name.

Her emotional and social development is quite good as well. She can eat her food without help and also she can wash and dry her hands independently. She is often shows sensitivity to others. She likes to be independent and strongly self-willed. She likes to be with other children and enjoys playing with other kids in the group. She understands the needs of others and the need to share and take turns. She tries to work out what is right and what is wrong.

Sometimes she acts out puppet shows and scenes she has seen on television. She plays role-play games with others. She also enjoys imaginative play, which helps her to cope with strong emotions.

She is making relationship and bonding with me because I’m always around her and talking to her most of the times. She has a good relationship with nursery nurses as well. She listens to them and asks questions.

There are different kinds of influences on the way children develop. Some of these influences are positive and some are negative. But these are the differences that make people individuals. Some differences are genetic such as eyes colours but there are other differences happen because of events in life. The way that children brought up is important as well because it will influence strongly in their development.

Child development is affected by education, neglect, the food available, communication, health facilities, affection, and opportunities for play, injury (accidental/non C accidental), and the amount of money available, praise, illness, social class, encouragement, the local environment, housing, and the people around the child.

The influences that I saw on S development are praise, encouragement, social class, and the people around her, affection, opportunities for play, the amount of money available and the amount of food available.

Praise and encouragement are influences that I saw on S’s development when she was helping tidy up with nursery nurse. Each time the nursery nurses were praising her and encouraging her to help, she was smiling and was happy to take responsibility.

The people around her are another effect that influences development. As I asked S, she lives with her parents and two older sisters and she is the last child. The family is really important in a Child’s development. This is important as she lives with her parents so that she gets affection from both sides and not like some children that live with single parent so that they don’t get enough affection and also it makes it more difficult for a single parent to give all the affection to the child. As she is the younger child she gets most of the attention and affection as well.

The amount of money and social class are the main factors that affect child development. As I saw S’s mum and even S herself, I found out that they have high income because S dresses up in different styles each time she comes to nursery. Also the amount of money they pay for nursery was quite a lot because in nursery they teach French and maths to the children.

The food available is another main factor that effect child development. As I saw she was having her pack lunch box with different types of food every day.

When I checked her health details her weight was normal. This shows that she has a healthy balanced diet.

The other factor that has effect on child development is the opportunities for playing. In the nursery were a lot of different play facilities for children to play such as imaginative play, water play, jigsaw puzzles, table-top play, drawing, painting, musical activities and also books.

It is very important that the care that child receives provides a secure base for her to grow within. The people caring for child are acting like her parents and so are responsible for child’s’ safety and happiness. The care that child receives is focused on building self-esteem, confidence and communication. The care that child receives from nursery will have influence on child’s pattern of development especially on child’s social and intellectual developments.

Some other care that can be offered are such as providing child with plenty of opportunities for exercise or play lotto and other matching games such as pairs. Encourage independence when going to the toilet. Let children practise using the computer mouse and carrying out simple computer activities and encourage the child to draw what she has seen. Let the child organise her own games with friends, to encourage independence and confidence. The care worker shouldn’t try to rush to help the child when she is finding an activity difficult. She should allow the child to practise new skills, offering praise and encouragement.

The care that was available in my placement was such as going with the child to the toilet, helping children when they want to eat their snacks and playing with them. There was play party games such as musical statues, to foster the ideas of wining, losing and co-operation. There was also French and maths classes available for the children as well.

They encouraged the child to play with toys, jigsaw puzzles and board games. They provided art and craft materials for painting and gluing and sticking activities. They encourage sand and water play and they were talk to the child and repeat favourite stories and encourage her to express her self. They went to the library and read books together. In the library the care worker was looking for book s and puzzles that help child to sort objects.

The care worker displayed S and other children’s painting around the nursery. This gives her a feeling of pride in her world.

The health factor that has influence on child’s’ development would be illness. For example if a child has injury (accidental/non-accidental) or if the child be ill she/ he would miss school for a while and she/he will keep behind. Another health factor that has influence on child’s development would be disability. Disability will effect physical, intellectual, emotional and social development of the child.

Physically the child would have problem if he/she is disabled and he/she couldn’t do some of the activities. Intellectually the child would fell behind other children because he/she would have less communication with other people outside and couldn’t improve his/her language. Emotionally the child would be sad, unhappy and isolated because he/she is disable and not like other children. Socially the child would have problem to make relationships with people outside because she/he didn’t have communication with other people.

The socio-economic factors that might have an influence on the development of child would be education, if the child grows up in a low income family she/he intellectually wouldn’t have a good education and physically the child would have poor diet and health. The child would have less healthy facilities and less opportunity for play.

Emotionally the child would have stress and feel upset. Socially the child will feel lonely and be fed up and have less communication. The local environment would be lower class and the amount of money available would be less.

But if the child has grown up in an upper social class family physically the child would have a good diet and health. Intellectually the child can afford better education. Emotionally the child will be much happier and feel safe. Socially the child would have more communication with other people. The child’s’ local environment would be upper class and the amount of money would be more. There would be more health facilities available and there would be more opportunities for play.

There was a slide and trampoline in the corner of the main hall and S was playing with the slide. Suddenly S fell down from the slide. J was playing with other children but when she saw S fall down she ran to help S. J was checking her to see if she was alright. But she was crying. J was hugging her and calming her down. S was holding J’s hand and J took her to the table where there were puzzles. J knew that she liked playing with puzzles. That’s why she took her to play with the puzzle. After five minutes she stopped crying.