Chapter 9 - Physical & Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood

Growth

Children grow about 2-3 inches each year between ages 6 and 11 and approximately double their weight during that period

Cognitive advances

Children in the middle childhood years have changes in their brain structure and functioning.

1. There is faster, more efficient information processing

2. Increased ability to ignore distractions

Sleep

Children between the ages of 6 to 13 require 9-11 hours of sleep each night

Rough-and-tumble play

Wrestling, kicking, hitting, tumbling, grappling, and chasing behaviors

Recess

Associated with improvements in academic performance, cognitive functioning, and physical and emotional health

Adverse effects of obesity in childhood include:

1. Depression and low self-esteem

2. Falling behind in physical and social functioning

3. High cholesterol and blood pressure

What solutions are there for preventing children from developing into being overweight or obese?

1. Less time in front of media or digital devices

2. Changes in food labeling

3. Changes in food advertising

4. Education on making better food choices

5. Increasing participation in physical activities

Acute medical condition

Occasional, short-term conditions, such as infections and warts, are common

Chronic medical condition

Physical, developmental, behavioral, or emotional conditions that persist for 3 months or more

Chronic conditions that have become increasingly common among children

Asthma and diabetes

Piaget’s stage 3: Concrete Operations

Children enter this stage when they can use mental operations, such as reasoning, to solve concrete (actual) problems, but are still limited in their thinking to the real world (they do not have abstract thinking yet)

Spatial relationships

The ability to engage in spatial visualization is associated with advances in numerical reasoning and skills. Children in this stage can:

• Interpret maps

• Find their way to/from school

• Estimate times

• Remember routes

Causality

The ability to make judgements about cause and effect improves during this stage

Categorization

The ability to categorize objects using a series of relatively sophisticated abilities

Categorization abilities

• Seriation

• Transitive inferences

• Class inclusion

Seriation

The ability to arrange objects in a SERIES according to one or more dimensions (examples: earliest to latest, shortest to longest, lightest to darkest, etc.)

Transitive inferences

Understanding the relationship between two objects by knowing the relationship of each to a third object

Class inclusion

The ability to see the relationship between a WHOLE and its parts, and to understand the categories within a whole

Inductive reasoning

Involves making observations about particular members of a class of people, animals, objects, or events, and then drawing conclusions about the class as a whole.

Deductive reasoning

This type of logical reasoning moves from a general premise about a class to a conclusion about a particular member or members of the class

Conservation

Children should now be able to understand the conservation of liquid task. This is because they now understand the principles of identity, reversibility, and decentration

Executive functioning

The conscious control of thoughts, emotions, and actions to accomplish goals or solve problems

Selective attention

The ability to deliberately direct one’s attention and shut out distractions

Working memory

Involves the short-term storage of information that is being actively processed

• The capacity of this is associated with academic achievement in a bidirectional fashion

• Allows children to call up and mentally manipulate required information from long-term memory systems when solving a problem

Mnemonic device

A strategy to aid memory. Children begin to benefit from learning these strategies. However, they do not often use these spontaneously.

1. External memory aids

2. Rehearsal

3. Organization

4. Elaboration

External memory aids

Prompts by something outside the person. Example: putting your backpack next to the back door so you remember to take it with you when you leave

Rehearsal

The conscious repetition of something

Organization

Mentally placing information into categories

Elaboration

Associating the item with something else

Metacognition

Thinking about thinking, or awareness of one’s own mental processes

Metamemory

Understanding the processes of memory

Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences

He believes that each person has several distinct forms of intelligence. He believes that there are eight specific areas of intelligence.

1. Linguistic

2. Logical-mathematical

3. Spatial

4. Musical

5. Bodily-kinesthetic

6. Interpersonal

7. Intrapersonal

8. Naturalist

9. Existential

Sternberg’s Triarchic Theory of Intelligence

Three elements of intelligence: Componential, experiential, and contextual

Componential element

This is the analytic aspect of intelligence. It determines how efficiently people process information. It helps people solve problems, monitor solutions, and evaluate the results

Experiential element

This is the insightful or creative aspect of intelligence. It determines how people approach novel or familiar tasks. It enables people to come up with new ways of putting facts together (think originally or creatively)

Contextual element

This is the practical aspect of intelligence. It helps people deal with their environment. It is the ability to size up a situation and decide what to do in a real-world context.

Second-language learning

In 2019, 23% of US children ages 5-17 spoke a language other than English at home, most commonly Spanish

Decoding

The child matches visual features of letters with phonemes and remembers which ones go together. It is also the process of phonetic analysis by which a printed word is converted to spoken form before retrieval from long-term memory.

Phonetic (code-emphasis) approach

The process of sounding out a word and translating it from print to speech before retrieving it from long-term memory.

Whole-language approach

This process emphasizes visually based retrieval of entire words from memory

Self-efficacy

An individual’s belief in their own ability to successfully perform specific tasks and achieve particular goals.

High self-efficacy

These students believe they can master schoolwork and regulate their own learning. Has a positive effect on motivation and self-regulation

Low self-efficacy

These students tend to become frustrated and depressed, feelings that make success increasingly elusive over time.

Intellectual disability

Significantly subnormal cognitive functioning. An IQ of 70 or less, along with a deficiency in age-appropriate adaptive behavior, appears before age 18.

Learning disabilities

Disorders that interfere with specific aspects of school achievement, such as listening, speaking, reading, writing, and mathematics.

Creativity

The ability to see situations in a new way, to produce innovations, and to see new solutions to old problems.

Convergent thinking

Thinking aimed at finding the one right answer to a problem. IQ tests tend to measure this type of thinking.

Divergent thinking

Involves coming up with a wide array of fresh, diverse possibilities