Middle+Childhood

=**Middle Childhood**=


 * 1. Describe the key components of physical development in middle childhood.**

Between age of 6 and 12 a child grows 2-3 inches and 5 lb a year. Girls are shorter and lighter from age 6-8 then they become heavier as they undergo puberty around age 9. Increase in muscle strength and lose ligaments lead to flexibility. Bone growth leads to growing pains. They develop fine motor skills around age 6.

Brain development reaches 90% of adult weight and handedness is established by age 7. All 20 primary teeth are lost and replaced with permanent ones while facial bones grow to accommodate new larger teeth.


 * 2. Describe the major components of social development in middle childhood.**

Group play, organized sport, rough play, physical education class give a structured environment and opportunity to develop skills both in terms of physical coordination as well as social skills and health.

Organized sports can provide a lot of stress and make things difficult for kids; emphasis on exercise and enjoyment can have a positive effect on future health.


 * 3. Discuss sexual development in middle childhood.**

Masturbation and sexual exploration occur, and is typically a natural part of development and not indicative of sexual abuse usually. Girls develop sooner with improved handwriting, drawing and activities requiring balance and agility. Boys develop superior physical ability, possibly due to social factors.

Parents generally give more independence to boys. Boys tend to gravitate towards mathematics and athletics while girls to reading, spelling, art and music. Girls are allowed more flexibility to their interests/options. Kids learn gender typicality and gender contentness. There is pressure to conform to gender roles, again with more flexibilty for girls (tomboys) than boys.


 * 4. Discuss the major components of morality in middle childhood.**

Distributive justice is by strict equality at age 5-6, merit (effort based) at age 6-7, and equity and benevolence (special consideration to disadvantaged) around age 8. At age 6-7 there is not a concrete basis for truth and lying (i.e., the truth is not always good). Kids being to assert some individual rights and begin to accept diversity and equality. Kids who are unable to accept diversity may have fixed personalities or over-inflated self-esteem based on prejudice.

Begin to develop values relative to group and social structure. Kids develop a group identity and develop trust and sensitivity with peers. Popular kids may discard the unpopular kids who go to form their own group of unaccepted kids but peer victimization can still occur.


 * 5. Discuss the cognitive aspects of development in middle childhood.**

Piaget concrete operational stage (see Theories of Development) age 7-11 is when concepts of conservation, classification, seriation (classification of objects based on properties/characteristics) and spatial reasoning (cognative ability to draw maps/give directions) are developed.

Improved ability to control internal and external distraction, resulting in better attention and ability to suppress distractions. Memory is improved using strategies such as rehearsal, organization, and elaboration (connecting unrelated words together to help with remembering). Kids understand that people form beliefs about other people, and that such beliefs can be wrong. The child begins to to evaluate ones self in life and school as cognative self-regulation is developed. They learn to continuously monitor progress towards a goal, check outcomes, and redirect unsuccessful efforts as they learn to be confident in their abilities.

Intelligence is hard to determine, especially in minority children due to cultural biases in the style of communication and knowledge. There are negative stereotypes that assume that certain kids don't do so well that can affect kids learning. Language development is rapid, enhanced by reading and learn about 20 words a day. Attention to students in school improves performance, both delayed and gifted. On average US children lag behind because instruction is not as challenging or focused. Also, US children learn by memorization rather than relating information to prior knowledge, and, thus, do not use different learning/memory strategies. Cultural values attached to academic achievement, emphasis on effort, and moral group obligation vs. individual need are factors that affect academic achievement.

Ideal educational environments should have small class size, well equipped activity centers, academic standards that help kids make sense of their learning, daily activites, interaction between children and teachers (problem solving, discussion), evaluation of progress (help kids reflect and decide how to improve), and periodic conferences with parents.

Children with special needs are sometimes placed in regular classes to help them prepare for the real world. This mainstreaming sometimes causes isolation problems. Achievement of special needs children depends on severity of disability, level of support and restrictiveness of educational setting.

Gifted children are capable of creativity to produce original yet appropriate work, divergent thinking of multiple possibilities when faced with a problem, convergent thinking to arrive at a single correct answer, and outstanding talent in a particular field. These children should be provided enrichment in regular classrooms and offered special instruction; advancement to higher grades is rare.


 * 6. Discuss the emotional aspects of development in middle childhood.**

Eriksson theory (see Theories of Development) places importance to self esteem during the industry vs. inferiority crisis. Industry is the sense of competence and confidence in skills. Inferiority is pessimism and low confidence in abilities. Failure of this crisis and inferiority can be due to the family not preparing the child enough during early childhood or result of a hostile environment where peers and teachers destroy the child's confidence.

Self concept is developed and kids are able to describe their personality, their weaknesses and their strengths; kids begin to compare themselves with their peers and develop an internal "idealized" self that they try to achieve. Self esteem is developed around 6-7 and is affected by culture and family influences, gender (boys have slightly better self-esteem), child rearing (assertive parents who allow discussion of decisions) and attributions of positive achievement to skill vs. luck. US children typically have good self-esteem but poorer achievements, suggesting an overly or artificially inflated self-esteem which may result in problems later. Self-esteem is based on //self//-perceptions of academic, social, physical, and athletic competence.

Better able to express and control internal emotion state and empathize emotion in others (i.e., figure out contradictory facial and situational cues). Kids develop self-conscious emotions and guilt/pride become governed by a sense of personal responsibility. Emotional regulation occurs, and kids are able to develop coping skills such as appraising a situation as changeable, identify the difficulty, and decide what to do. If little can be done, kids develop emotional coping skills to control distress.


 * 7. Discuss the possible challenges faced in middle childhood and their impact.**

Divorce can have a significant negative impact on the child, as changes in housing, income, school, family role, and responsibilities occur. Discipline may become harsh and inconsistent as parents are stressed out. Parent with more custody time may be strict and implement more behavioral modification while the parent with less custody time may tend to spoil the child. Children age 5-6 often blame themselves and may act out. Some kids may become more mature and responsible.

Maternal employment can serve as a positive role model, as long as schedule does not conflict with family time. Resilience of children is promoted by easy temperament, good parenting, good support system, and community support from school/social services.

Kids develop notion of self-causation cause illness to occur from disobedient behavior but being to understand body processes and functions. Hospitalization can result in concern of lack of body control and inadequacy. It is important to explain to hospitalized kids whats going on help them handle their anxiety and minimize interference with development. Kids begin to understand the irreversibly of death and death becomes real, final, inevitable and universal.


 * 8. Discuss the impact of school and family influence in middle childhood.**

School and family have a joint impact on childhood development. Family life can serve to provide a good basis for interpersonal interaction in school. As the child grows older they begin to transition to a more peer based development.

Parents are still the most influential factor in middle childhood, now allowing children to be in charge of moment to moment decisions while providing general oversight. Siblings are somewhat more problematic when parents treat or kids perceive parents as treating siblings differentially. There are also issues of less parental affection, disapproval, rivalry, and fewer maternal resources.

Only children benefit from positive attention of parents and are usually not spoiled, but may lack interpersonal skills and have less acceptance in peer groups when they enter school.