Development in Middle Childhood

middle childhood (6-12 years)

• Period of training and socialization that prepares children to become productive members of society

• Independent in daily occupations

• Develop formal occupational roles

• Build real friendships- peers are IMPORTANT!

• Broader self-management skills emerge

hemispheric lateralization

Parts of the brain develop more differentiation and areas become more specialized

• Indicates an evolutionary advantage

• From age 6, right hemisphere activity starts increasing and becomes specialized for analysis of space, shape, and forms.

• Hand dominance is connected to this

evolutionary advantage

capacity to perform separate parallel tasks in each hemisphere of the brain

increased myelination 

• The corpus callosum fully myelinates during middle childhood

• Allows for faster, more effective communication between two hemispheres

• Supports sensory and motor integration

• Improves reaction time

• Functional communication throughout the brain improves

• Effective communication is associated with measure of intelligence

frontal lobe

Attention, abstraction, organization, planning, time management, cognitive flexibility, insight, and judgement

preschool children

in _ frontal lobe functions to support improvement of self-regulation and the ability to inhibit impulses

school aged children

in _ the influence of the frontal lobe expands to allow improvements with cognitive flexibility

visual deficits

• Impact eye-hand coordination

• Children with visual impairments must rely on ear-hand coordination, which develops later than eye-hand coordination

auditory

o Search for and find auditory stimuli

o Can hear, remember, repeat, and recall words, phrases, and sequences of numbers

o Auditory information is critical to process language

o Hearing impairments have a strong impact on language development, depending on the severity

hearing loss 

loss of greater than 35 decibels (dB) in the better hearing ear

essential skills for school-ages children

• Stability and Alignment when standing or sitting

• Moving and interacting with objects in their environment

• Ability to adjust to postural challenges without interference with working memory is an essential support to classroom learning

• Coordinated hand use for tool manipulation

physical & muscoskeletal growth

• Slow and steady growth rate

• 2-3 inches a year

Most growth is in the limbs

• COG lowers towards pelvic

• Epiphyseal (growth) plates remain open, but bone density increases

gross motor development

• dramatic increased in muscular strength

• refine complex skills — can calibrate better

• balance improves — linked to reaction time

• dual tasking improves

fine motor development 

• Haptic perception, in hand manipulation skills, speed and dexterity improve throught middle childhood 

• Variety of strategies used to perform the task decreases (deeper attractor wells!)

• Due to continued maturation of CNS

• Improvements in reaching and calibration of hand and arm movements result in improved accuracy

• Complexity of bimanual tasks increases

coincidence anticipation timing

• The ability to time a movement in response to another moving object

• Assists with timing of motor actions, such as catching a ball

hand dominance

• By the age of a 5 children usually demonstrate a hand preference

• One hand has the most influence or control in the performance of skilled tasks

• Genetic factors are the strongest, but also cultural and environmental factors

• Inconsistent or mixed-handedness may be an indicator of CNS immaturity

mastered skills for hand dominance 

• Postural control,

• Eye-hand coordination,

• Complementary bimanual function,

• Majority of perceptual concepts

working memory

Ability to hold information in the mind to do verbal and nonverbal reasoning tasks

• The number of items that can be stored and manipulated at a time is the working memory “span”

• Varies with age, innate ability, and pace with which the information is presented

• Dramatic improvements in working memory after age 7

metamemory 

Type of metacognition that involves a conscious awareness of one’s memory capabilities and the intentional strategies to aid memory

• Rehearsal- Repeating information to

oneself over and over again

• Organization- Grouping together related items 

• Mnemonics- Used a word, acronym, or other device to create a relationship

praxis

AKA motor planning; able to plan, organize, and sequence a new task

reaction time

allows the person to quickly move the arms and/or legs in response to a stimulus

o Some cases, slow reaction time related to poor temporal awareness

o Improvements with reaction time support development of CA timing

psychomotor function

Specific mental function of control over both motor and psychological events at the body level, including the ability to manipulate and control objects

• Coincidence-anticipation timing

figure-ground perception (8 yrs) 

Ability to locate and focus on an object embedded in a distracting background

size constancy (11 yrs)

Ability to recognize that objects maintain a constant size even if their distance from the observer varies

depth perception (12 yrs)

Ability to judge distances and recognize the 3-D nature of objects

kinesthetic

Linked to learning musical instruments and ball sports in school

• Relative position of body parts to each other

• Position of body in space

• Awareness of body’s movement

higher-order cognitive functions 

pre-frontal cortex 

• Also called executive functions

• Include planning, decision-making, organizing, problem-solving, and adapting behavior to achieve goals

• In middle childhood, children can process information faster and in higher capacity

• They go beyond basic cognitive operations like attention, perception, as they involve using those basic processes intentionally

cogntiive flexibility (7-12)

The ability to shift thinking or attention between different tasks, rules, or perspectives

• Emerges strongly between ages 7–12, as children learn to manage multiple rules, viewpoints, and strategies

• Supports adaptability in learning, problem solving, and social interaction

ex: During group work, understanding that others may think differently and adjusting one’s own plan accordingly

cognitive monitoring

A higher-level cognitive function that involves self-examination of what you are currently doing, what you will do next, and how effectively the activity is serving to meet your intended purpose

• Ex: A child completing a school assignment

self management

• Coincides with metacognitive development

Self-regulation challenges in school:

o Staying quiet in lines

o Raising your hand before you speak

o Use crayons only when told

• Dramatic improvements in this area from 6-10 year

cognitive maps 

•  Used to construct and accumulate spatial knowledge, allowing the ”mind’s eye” to visualize images and enhance recall and learning of information

• Mental representations of physical locations and remember important features of the environment

• What we use to get around our house, help you figure out where the bathroom is at the mall, etc. all based on past experience

• Emerges in middle childhood and continues to develop through adolescence

temproal awareness (7-10 yrs)

A complex understanding of the passage of time

• Time as it relates to planning, sequencing, and altering of movements; manifests in many ways:

o Passage of time (before, now, after)

o Experience of movement of objects across space

o Experience of timing in the sense of music and rhythm

o Sequence of actions (what comes first, next, last)

• Ex. How fast do I need to run to kick the ball? Do I have time to get a snack before we leave for school? Skipping, dancing, playing the piano

spatial awareness

• The process through which people become aware of the relative positions of their own bodies and objects around them

• Can I fit through that window on the play house? Will those bushes scratch my arm if I walk through that space?

• Children with poorly developed schemas often are clumsy but compensate using visual system

body schema

a specialized form of spatial awareness that manifests as an internalized sense of the space that their body occupies and the space immediately surrounding our bodies

abstract thinking (10-12)

• The ability to think beyond concrete experiences and consider ideas, relationships, and possibilities that are not directly observable

• Children start to handle hypothetical, moral, and future-oriented concepts

self concept

the composite of ideas, feelings, and attitudes that the child has about their own identity, self-worth, capabilities, and limitations

• Grows in complexity throughout middle childhood and has distinct spheres by adolescence (academic, social, family, etc.)

• Teachers play a strong role in development of self-concept

emotional development

• Gain ability to recognize and discuss their feelings

• Can hide or show emotions based on social context

• Children begin to compare themselves with their peers to see how they measure up (less egocentric)

• Strong desire to identify their place in the world

stress

• Demand of situation > ability to cope and resolve it

• Ability to deal with stress in middle childhood shapes how they cope with situations in adolescence and adulthood

• Can be caused by transitions, need to adapt, or changes

Types of stressors:

a) School: grades and extracurricular activities

b) Family: fear of disappointing, high expectations, divorce, sibling

c) Interpersonal: being liked by peers, bullying

d) Others: media, future, health or well-being

positive stress 

sense of pressure that results from challenging experiences, but is short lived

tolerable stress

adverse life experiences that are more intense than those causing positive stress, but are still mostly short lived (may require support)

toxic stress

stress that results from intense adverse experiences that may be sustained over a long period of time

• Associated with child abuse and neglect

• Can lead to permanent brain changes