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1.4 Social and Emotional Development: Influence of Development In Early Years

How Development in Early Years Influences Development in the Elementary Years

Atypical early child development in the social and/or emotional arenas1 is likely to be also present as the child grows older. If not effectively addressed, social and emotional difficulties will turn into more serious behaviors. Atypical behaviors may signal caregivers about issues that need immediate attention and that are not part of a phase the child will “come out of ” on his or her own.

  • Some of the concerns about atypical social and emotional behaviours evolving into serious issues in the middle/adolescent school years include: A child not growing emotionally at par with other children his age, or “stunted emotional growth”;
  • A child showing cruelty to others and/or to animals;
  • A child having extremely low self-esteem;
  • A child being dependent on others to feel good about self;
  • A child at higher risk for suicide attempts;
  • A child being  unsafe about personal and intimate relationships (i.e., promiscuity);
  • A child engaging in risky, unsafe and/or criminal behaviors, including drug and alcohol use; truancy, and/or dropping out of school.

Children who continue to display atypical social and emotional skills beyond the early childhood years may end up being diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder or conduct disorder.

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1.5 Communication Development: How Development In Early Years Affects Development in the Elementary Years

How Development in Early Years Effects Development in Elementary Years

Children who have difficulties with language in the early childhood years1 will very likely continue to exhibit difficulties with language in the elementary years and beyond. If these difficulties are not addressed, they will get more serious and will have a negative effect on practically all aspects of the child’s life. This applies to all aspects of language: receptive, expressive, pragmatic and articulation. Children with language delays do not “outgrow” them. With appropriate support however, they may acquire and develop many of the basic skills.

Children with language delays by age 5 years, at they begin the elementary school years (and beyond) may exhibit the following behaviours:

Children with difficulties with receptive language:

  • May look as if they do not pay attention, because they may not understand what is being asked of them;
  • May only hold a small number of words in their vocabulary;
  • May continue to experience difficulties in social situations, because of their receptive language skills difficulties.

Children with difficulties with expressive language:

  • May continue to find it difficult to be part of groups and  other social situations, and avoid them completely;
  • May continue to feel that they are “different” from others (e.g., things that are easy for others are difficult for them, both in and out of school situations);
  • May struggle with learning how to read and write, and have trouble with subjects like socials, sciences and math that are language-based.

Children with difficulties with pragmatics :

  • May continue to avoid social situations, because it is hard for them to be a part of a conversation;
  • May be avoided or made fun of by other children, because of their  difficulties with language when sharing with others;
  • May be aware of their language difficulties, continue to feel ‘bad’ (see full Glossary) about themselves.

Children with difficulties with articulation:

  • May avoid social situations, because of difficulties with some speech sounds
  • May choose not to talk to avoid other children making fun of them.
  • May be aware of their speech difficulties, continue to feel ‘bad’ about themselves.

Children with language delays who show these behaviours need additional support at school; otherwise, these behaviours could become more complex between 5 and 12 years old. Knowing of how these language difficulties may effect a child is important in any of the four aspects of language. Not being successful in language and communication skills may have long lasting effects. These difficulties may prevent the child from being included in activities such as school plays, debates or any other meetings, or just ‘mingling’ with children and adults. As adolescents and young adults, any daily life situations that include language and communication become difficult, for example, talking to a bank-teller or contacting one’s doctor.

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1.6 Cognitive Development: Overview

Cognitive Development

A Brief Overview1

In the Typical Cognitive Development section of this course, we described how cognitive development involves the development of thinking or evaluation and coping, or ‘adaptation’ skills. Thinking or evaluation skills, such as “thinking outside the box2 (see full Glossary),” are related to the development of intelligence (see full Glossary). Coping skills involve the ability to adapt to changes in one’s environment.  Cognitive skills also look at creativity, the ability to learn new things, retain (see full Glossary) what one has learned, and how one applies information to new situations. Cognitive development also includes pre-academic and academic skills that children need in order to succeed at school. Examples might include the ability to sit quietly for certain periods of time, the ability to listen and follow instructions and the ability to perform paper and pencil tasks.

Some children do not develop these skills at par with their peers. They may develop some of these skills much later than others —or not develop them at all. In other words, atypical cognitive development involves difficulties with both the quality and quantity of certain skills (see full Glossary):

Severe cognitive delays often effect all other areas of development. Below are some signs of cognitive delays that can be observed in all areas of development between the preschool and school age years, around ages 3 – 5 years old.

In the domain of cognitive development:

  1. Children may experience serious difficulties in learning basic concepts (e.g. colors and shapes);
  2. Children may experience serious difficulties in learning advanced concepts (e.g. counting, reading and writing);
  3. Children may experience serious difficulties in generalizing what they learn from one situation to the next;
  4. Children may experience serious difficulties in adapting to changes in their environment and to new situations.

In the domain of social/emotional development:

  1. Children may trust others too easily and readily enabling others to take advantage of them;
  2. Children may not read visual or language cues as they their attempt to socialize with others.

In the domain of motor development:

  1. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their fine motor skills;
  2. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their gross motor skills

In the domain of communication development:

  1. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their receptive language skills;
  2. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their expressive language skills;
  3. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their pragmatic skills;
  4. Children may exhibit delays in the development of their articulation skills.

In the domain of adaptive skills:

During the preschool years:

  1. Children may be delayed in becoming toilet trained, and in extreme cases, may never be toilet trained.

During the elementary school years:

  1. Children may experience difficulties bathing and cleaning themselves properly;
  2. Children may experience difficulties with dressing and undressing.

During the high school years:

  1. Male adolescents may experience difficulties with knowing how and when to shave;
  2. Female adolescents may experience difficulties knowing how to handle their menstrual cycle.

Severe cognitive delays have been linked to developmental disabilities (also known as mental retardation and developmental challenges). Developmental disabilities involve global delays and affect all areas of development, including motor, language, social and emotional, and self-help skills.

1. see References
2. Source: University of Wahington, available at: http://faculty.washington.edu/ezent/imdt.htm

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