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Child Study Paper

EDPS 250

Section 2

Sarah Conry

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The Child

I observed Charlee at the UNL Children' Center and only saw her in an afterschool play

setting. The Children's Center has a diverse student population but Caucasian children are the

majority, there is a fairly even split between boys and girls and the ages of children at the Center

ranges from infants to kindergarteners. The child I observed was a bright and happy four and a

half year old female named Charlee. She was in kindergarten and appeared by all outward signs

to be a typically developed, healthy child; standing at the same height as most other children in

her class and having average motor skills expected of a four year old. Charlee was Caucasian

with very fair skin and medium blonde hair cut in a short bob style. Every time I saw her she

was well dressed and wearing matching, fashionable outfits.

My first impression of Charlee was that she was rather outgoing but I soon realized that

she also had a more reserved, shy streak to her as well. One consistency that I observed was that

the girl was a very independent child. She both enjoying playing with other children and playing

by herself and I rarely saw her angry or upset in any way. These types of qualities led me to

believe that she had an easy going temperament. To summarize the meaning of this term,

"Temperament refers to a child's typical ways of responding to events and novel stimulation and

of regulating impulses" (Kagan & Fox, 2006; Rothbart, Sheese, & Conradt, 2009). Authors

McDevitt & Ormrod (2013) concede that temperaments lead to characteristics that in part make

up personalities later in a child's life (p. 442). I would presume that Charlee was a happy infant

with a healthy, secure attachment style based on the way I saw her behave in my observation

setting and with her parents. She showed signs throughout my observations of being somewhere

in the center of the extraversion/introversion spectrum, high in agreeability and openness, and

low in neuroticism (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2013, p.444). These conclusions were made by the

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way she equally enjoyed playing by herself and with others, generally got along with her peers,

and always appeared to be very much in control of her emotions. I saw her get rather upset and

exceedingly happy, yet she always showed signs of self regulating how she felt in the different

situations she was placed in. A particular event where she showed a great deal of emotion

regulation was when she impulsively threw a piece of chalk at a little boy she was angry at;

rather than doing further damage she apologized right away and then began playing with the

little boy again as if nothing had happened. Initially it appeared as though she would explode but

she was able to keep her cool and let the incident pass without even holding a grudge.

I would describe Charlee's peer relationships as healthy but distant. I rarely saw her in

conflict with any other child. When she did have conflicts, she did not hold grudges or mistreat

anyone but moved on very quickly from any bad feelings she may have had. Charlee was always

accepted by her peers and she did not seem to ever withdraw from them even though half of the

time I observed her she chose to play by herself. I do believe that it was a conscious decision on

her part to play alone because the children never appeared to be excluding or rejecting her nor

she withdrawing from them. It seems to me that she would probably be in the "popular" or

"neglected" group of child popularity classification (Swenson, Class notes, 12/2/14) because I

definitely got the impression that she was well-liked and accepted by her peers but she was not

constantly surrounded with other children. She would probably more likely be on the

"neglected" list only because she was distant and quieter than many other children. However,

either way I would confidently predict that she will probably grow up to be a well-liked

adolescent.

In terms of adult relationships I saw very clearly that she really liked to talk to the

teachers at the Children's Center quite often. At least once per observation session, I would see

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her going over to a teacher and initiating a conversation. There were a few times that I noticed

Charlee showing some signs of mild jealousy when a teacher would be interacting with a

different child. Interestingly, I saw that Charlee was usually very clingy with the teachers at the

Children's Center and seemed to constantly need to be hanging on them and checking in with

them. Besides the girl's parents I did not see her interact with any other adults besides the

teachers so I can't say whether or not she was always clingy with adults.

As for Charlee's cognitive development level, I would make an educated guess that she

was the preoperational stage in regards to Jean Piaget's theory about cognitive development in

children. This cognitive stage can be identified by the beginning of symbolic thought, rapid

expansion of language skills, extensive pretend play, egocentrism, and a lack of conservation

understanding (Swenson, Class Notes, 9/11/2014). Egocentrism is "Inability of a child in

Piaget's preoperational stage to view situations from another person's perspective" (McDevitt &

Ormrod, 2013, p. 202) and conservation is the "Realization that if nothing is added or taken

away, an amount stays the same regardless of any alterations in shape or arrangement"

(McDevitt & Ormrod, 2013, p. 202). The fundamental reason I believe that Charlee must have

been in this stage of development was because her age would be the general standard for when

children will be right in the middle of the preoperational stage. However, I could not easily see

classic signs of this stage in Charlee's behaviors. I think that I may have witnessed a bit of the

lack of conservation in how Charlee and her friends played in the sandbox. There were several

occasions were Charlee played in the playground's sandbox either by herself or with friends, on

more than one occasion I noticed how she would try to place the same amount of sand into two

different sized containers. It could be that she wasn't intending for the amount of sand to fit into

both bowls but it's more likely that she was unable to understand the differences in amount

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versus the space available for the amount. Another instance I can recall that may have been a

sign of egocentrism was how she preferred to play on her own rather than play a game with her

friends that she wasn't interested in. I got the impression that she was more concerned with

pleasing herself than socializing with the other children at the Center.

More clues that showed the cognitive and intellectual abilities that Charlee had were seen

in her usually appropriate usage of schemas. These are defined by authors McDevitt & Ormrod

(2013) as "Tightly integrated set of ideas about a specific object or situation" (p. 251) by child

development theorist, Piaget. She incorrectly used schemas one day when playing in the

sandbox and using a small shovel to fill a pitcher with sand; later on taking these same objects

and turning them into musical instruments. Another instance was when Charlee was playing

with another little boy with a basketball and a little basketball hoop, the hoop was turned on its

side and Charlee was throwing the ball at the backboard. Yet another situation was a time when

she and a few other children were playing "kitties" and Charlee would not allow one little boy to

pretend to be a dog, she didn't think that cats and dogs could be able to play together. Only in

the last example did conflict arise between Charlee and a peer, the little boy who wanted to be a

dog instead of a cat. The conflict had to be settled with the intervention of a teacher and was the

most severe occurrence that I witnessed while observing Charlee.

The girl's use and misuse of schemas can be understood through the Piaget theory

principle of equilibration, "movement from equilibrium to disequilibrium and back to

equilibrium; a process that promotes the development of increasingly complex forms of thought

and knowledge" (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2013, p. 198). Essentially, children are constantly being

exposed to new things and therefore having their previously understood schemas challenged.

They are thrown into a state of confusion until they can find a strategy to categorize their new

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information into either a currently identified schema or entirely new schema (Swenson, Class

notes, 9/16/2014). For the most part, however, Charlee displayed a high capability within her

cognitive level.

Child development counterpart, Lev. Vygotsky, had some different ideas about how

children develop cognitively alongside social development. In his theory, a child develops by

means of three factors: previous experiences, social/cultural influences, and biological factors

(Swenson, Class Notes, 9/18/2014). I could see signs of Charlee's social and cognitive levels

and how they were related by means of understanding Vygotsky's theoretical principles. The

theory is marked by self-aiding cognitive tools such as self-talk, inner speech, internalization,

appropriation, and sociodramatic play. (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2013, p. 216-220). Charlee

showed signs of self-talk on several occasions; she would wander around the playground by

herself and mumble inaudibly to herself or sing made-up songs. She was very open about such

behaviors and never tried to hide when speaking to herself and none of the other children at the

Center ever mentioned it, however, it did entertain the teachers. I could not make out instances

of inner speech, internalization - the changing of external activities into internal activities - and

appropriation - the adopting of others' ways of thinking (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2013, p. 217-218).

These cognitive strategies are mostly internal therefore not easily recognizable when observing

but there were a few times I noticed Charlee soundlessly mouthing to herself which I can only

assume was a mixture between self-talk and inner-speech. At the time she was not doing any

particular activity but it's still likely that she was using these strategies in an effort to accomplish

or think through the process of a task. One of the strategies that I did see Charlee use was

sociodramatic play when she played "Kitties" with some other children. This game was

essentially characterized by all the children acting as cats, they seemed content to play without a

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basis or storyline and focused on "pouncing" on each other and pretending to lick themselves as

felines do. According to Vygotsky, such behaviors are exactly what should be expected for a

child Charlee's age and therefore very healthy.

The Zone of Proximal Development is another part of Vygotsky's child development

theory. McDevitt & Ormrod (2013) explain this concept as, "The range of tasks that children

cannot yet perform independently but can perform with the help and guidance of others" (p.

219). Since I did not get to see Charlee in a classroom setting, there's no way I can know how

high or low Charlee was within her "ZPD" but there were occasions when I could see how

teachers would aid her in tasks. One example of this would be when Charlee played games with

one of the teachers at the Center, there was a day that the teacher taught Charlee and a few other

children how to play "duck, duck, goose". She showed them by explaining the rules, sitting them

down in the correct circle type layout, and then showing them how they should chose the "goose"

and run around the circle. Such an action could also be considered a means of Scaffolding.

Scaffolding is the action of a more competent individual helping a child accomplish a task within

his or her Zone of Proximal Development. This assistance can be in the form of

modeling/demonstrating how to accomplish the task, deconstructing a complex task into many

simple tasks, and asking questions that lead the child to the correct conclusion (McDevitt &

Ormrod, 2013, p. 223).

Charlee's desire to keep herself happy rather than worry about connecting with her peers,

despite this characteristic she actually had a good capability with interacting with others. She

was able to use sensory information processing (Swenson, Class notes, 11/5/2014) to the most

competent degree to ensure maximum success in peer interactions. The first step of the process,

observing the social environment, Charlee always seemed to be looking around and seeing what

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other children on the playground were doing. The second and third steps, interpreting cues and

clarifying social goals respectively, I could see in that she never read the social cues of the other

children incorrectly and could not interact with them in the necessary way; this brought me to the

conclusion that she must have been aware of what she wanted to accomplish with her

interactions or lack of interactions with other children at the playground. It's not possible to

pinpoint what her past interactions had taught her (the fourth step of sensory information

processing) she was very good about jumping into games at appropriate times and being able to

make her social intentions clear to the other children involved in the exchange (Swenson, Class

notes, 11/5/2014). In terms of the interaction between Charlee's cognitive development and

social development, she seemed to be at average or above average maturity and therefore easily

able to communicate and relate to her peers.

From what I saw of Charlee's behaviors and interactions with others I would guess that

she has a high self-concept, self-esteem, self- efficacy, and motivation. The reason I think that

she has a high self-concept is because she seemed very confident in what things she was

interested in and what she liked to do whether or not she was impressing her peers. From that I

could infer that she would most likely have a high self-esteem as well because if she was

confident and assertive in who she was then it is logical that she would feel good about herself

(Swenson, Class Notes, 11/5/2014). In terms of self-efficacy it was difficult to tell how she felt

about her abilities without specifically asking her but I got a heavy impression that she has a high

self-efficacy as well. McDevitt & Ormrod (2013) define self-efficacy as, "Belief that one is

capable of executing certain behaviors or reaching certain goals" (p.499). There was once

instance when Charlee was running around with a group of other children (an activity that she

often participated in) and made a comment about how fast she could run. It was just one time

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that I noticed which would point to the fact that she feels good about her abilities enough to point

them out to others' but either doesn't feel quite confident enough to brag about her abilities.

Charlee's motivation also appeared to be high because when she set herself to a task she would

do it very whole-heartedly. In my class notes I have motivation described as, "A state that

energizes, directs, and sustains behavior" (Swenson, 11/13/2014) and I distinctly used words

such as "focused" and "dedicated" when addressing the way that Charlee took on tasks. There

was one specific occasion when Charlee was scooping up all the outlier sand and putting it back

in the sandbox. I never found out if there was a reason for doing this but I thought it was

extremely interesting that she took it upon herself and really tried hard to complete the mission.

She ended up calling it quits but she did make quite a bit of progress.

I do think that self-concept, self-esteem, self-efficacy, and motivation were related in

Charlee's case because they all seemed to play off each other directly to and were all high. My

insinuation that they all were connected was because Charlee by all outward appearances had a

good sense of self which had been developed by the fact that she nearly always had positive and

successful interaction with her peers and, from the little I could see, interactions with her parents.

Because she had a high sense of self, it carried over from knowing who she was to feeling good

about herself and her abilities. Also, I would say that social interactions do in fact play a role in

motivation for her because when I saw her completing the sand scooping task, she had at least

two other little girls alongside helping her and in other situations she gained her motivation to be

competitive in playground games like "tag" and "chase" from energy provided by her peers.

Motivation for Charlee was mostly internal but was seemingly heightened by external factors.

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The Family

I saw Charlee interact with her parents almost every observation when they came to pick

her up. Every time she saw them she would run over to them and give whoever came a hug and

immediately begin to tell them about her day. Sometimes her mom came to pick her up and

other times it was her father so I could infer that her family was classically structured with two

parents of opposite gender. The parenting style that was most fitting for what I observed

definitely looked as though Charlee was raised was an authoritative parenting style. This style

is, "...characterized by emotional warmth, high expectations and standards for behavior,

consistent enforcement of rules, explanations regarding the reasons behind these rules, and the

inclusion of children in decision making" (McDevitt & Ormrod, 2013, p.80). Charlee showed

signs of being raised in such a way because she was always extremely well behaved at the Center

and was respectful to her teachers and her parents when she was with them. There was one

occasion when her dad was picking her up and as she was waiting for her teacher and her father

to end their conversation. She wandered over to were my backpack was and began playing with

the key chains I had attached. When her father noticed he told her to stop touching things that

didn't belong to her and she immediately obeyed; an example of obedience and respect for her

father's instructions. The conclusion that I made was that she must have learned to be respectful

and well-mannered because of the high expectations and standards that her parents had

impressed on her even at a young age.

Charlee showed very obvious signs of growing up in American, and specifically

Nebraskan, culture because of the way she dressed, spoke, and behaved. She often wore

"Nebraska Huskers" clothing or outfits that had Disney characters on them which are common

practices for children in American culture. When playing she wanted to start games such as

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"kitties" because cats were animals that she was very familiar with. All the children at the

Children's Center would get very excited when they heard a motorcycle and Charlee was no

exception. Charlee also liked playing with tricycles, footballs, basketballs, and bouncy balls

whenever she had the chance, these were things she played with accompanied by her friends

because they could all relate and understand the same traditions and toys due to all coming from

a similar culture. Another aspect might be the way that Charlee interacted with her parents upon

being reunited with them at the end of the school day. She greeted her parents by giving them a

very energetic hug and speaking to them without being having first been asked a question.

Though there are other cultures that might share in some of these attributes, they are fairly

specific in their Midwestern American culture.

The Teachers

The interaction that took place between Charlee and her teachers was almost always

positive interaction; Charlee seemed to be very well like by all the teachers. There were only

two occasions when the teachers had to be even a little bit stern with her and even then she did

not react in a difficult or oppositional way. The first of these was when she got into a fight with

a little boy when she refused to let him play "kitties" with her and some other children because

he wanted to be a dog. Charlee and the boy approached a teacher and both began accusing the

other child but the teacher calmly asked Charlee to apologize and she did so without complaint,

so it was not a very difficult situation for the teacher to handle. The second instance was when

Charlee got jealous of one of the teachers because the teacher was giving attention to another

child. Charlee began inappropriately inserting herself into the teacher and other child's play and

would not leave them alone. The teacher handled the situation by taking Charlee aside subtly

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and asking her to go play something else. This Charlee also complied with although she was not

very willing to. For my part I believe I would handle the situations in the same manner as the

teachers because their techniques worked very aptly and they did not need to do or say anything

else to get their point across to Charlee. I would not have inflicted any sort of punishment

because there was absolutely no need to act in any way other than discussing the incidences with

the girl.

The theoretical views of the teachers could not so easily be seen because there were

several teachers at the Child's Care Center. It would not possible to pinpoint one specific

theoretical orientation for all but Charlee's main teacher seemed to me to be a behaviorism

focused teacher. According to McDevitt & Ormrod (2013), "Behaviorism: Theoretical

perspective in which children's behavioral and emotional responses change as a direct result of

particular stimuli" (p. 13). I find that this theory most fits the way the teacher interacted with her

students when they played out on the playground and I never saw her teach them in a classroom.

The teacher was very invested in each and every one of her students and understood what

behaviors were considered typical for each child. When a child's parent came to pick him or her

up the teacher would always give the parent a concise overview of the behaviors she had seen

from that child throughout the day. Besides this, when the teacher talked to children when they

acted up, she generally seemed to focus on saying things that displayed why the behaviors were

hurtful and how to correct them. It's possible that part of the reason that Charlee was so good at

following directions was because her teacher emphasized it in the classroom - but that's just

speculation.

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Reflection

I found the observations, process of writing this paper, and the assignment as a whole to

be exceptionally helpful with learning how to better understand the minds of children based on

the many variables that come with increasing development. As an aspiring Speech-Language

Pathologist I know that I will very likely be working with children at least on occasion therefore,

learning about the different levels and key points in a child's development may mean the

difference between how aptly a therapy technique will work for the child. A definite highlight of

information that I found to be interesting and beneficial was that regarding theorists, Piaget and

Vygotsky. I thought it was very fascinating to have the chance to learn about their theories in

depth as well as witness the concepts first hand in the observations. In the process of writing this

final paper I got to really think critically about how both of the theories, though quite different

from each other, are both applicable to understanding child development.

Another aspect that we learned about in class and I was able to witness first hand while

observing was how Charlee's upbringing effected how she behaved and interacted with others.

In other words, I got to see how the parenting style of Charlee's parents manifested itself in the

girl herself. Though much of what I inferred about Charlee's parents, their parenting style, and

how much it has affected her behaviors was completely speculation and there's no way I can

know for sure if I'm correct, it's thought provoking that upbringing has the capability to

completely change the way a child will develop and grow up. I thought that was fascinating

because it was one of those concepts that I did not easily understand until I was able to

physically see it for myself through observations and actually make the connection through the

process of writing the final paper. Ways in which I could see Charlee's parenting effects were

how well mannered she was, especially in comparison with many of the other children at the

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Center. There were times when I saw her waiting patiently, playing nicely with other children,

saying, "please" and "thank you" to both peers and adults, and listening to and promptly

following instructions. Such behaviors really reflect well on the parents and on Charlee's own

character.

If I cannot use the information I have found from observing and writing this paper in any

other way it will most definitely come in handy in terms of parenting. As I mentioned before,

much of a child's developmental progress and success in social and academic areas are all from

the foundation that a child will receive from his or her home life. The greatest connection I can

make with this information is that it's important for a parent to be the first teacher and provide

adequate standards and discipline to ensure that the child develops at the expected levels,

develops a strong sense of self as well as high self-esteem and self-efficacy, and is exposed to

positive social situations often. Such attributes are important for a child mentally, physically, and

emotionally. With the foundations of cognitive development a child learns how to appropriately

interact with peers, as well as other adults, regardless of his or her temperament and personality.

Nurturing a child's development takes much more thought and planning than it is typically given

credit for.

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References

Kagan, J.K., & Fox, N.A. (2006). Biology, culture, and temperamental biases. In W. Damon &

R.M. Lerner (Eds. in Chief) & N. Eisenberg (Vol. Ed.), Handbook of child

psychology, Vol. 3. Social, emotional, and personal development (6th. ed.,

pp. 167-225). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

McDevitt, T.M., Ormrod, J.E. (2013). Child development and education (5th ed.). Boston, MA:

Pearson Education, Inc.

Swenson, S. (2014). Class notes. In EDPS 250: Fundamentals of child development.