PHYSICAL AND COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT IN EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

ENURESIS

repeated, involuntary urination at night by children old enough to be expected to have bladder control, is not unusual.

MYELIN

a fatty substance that coats the axons of nerve fibers and accelerates neural conduction.

CORPUS CALLOSUM

is a thick band of nerve fibers that connects both hemispheres of the brain and allows them to communicate more rapidly and effectively with each other.

GROSS MOTOR SKILLS

Physical skills that involve the large muscles.

FINE MOTOR SKILLS

Physical skills that involve the small muscles and eye-hand coordination.

SYSTEMS OF ACTION

Increasingly complex combinations of skills, which permit a wider or more precise range of movement and more control of the environment.

HANDEDNESS

the preference for using one hand over the other, is usually evident by about age 3. 

STUNTED

children appear to be of normal weight but are shorter than they should be for their age and may have cognitive and physical deficiencies. 

WASTED

Other children are an appropriate height for their age but are thinner than they should be. 

PREOPERATIONAL STAGE

the second major stage of cognitive development, in which symbolic thought expands but children cannot yet use logic effectively.

SYMBOLIC FUNCTION

Being able to think about something in the absence of sensory or motor cues.

DEFERRED IMITATION

children imitate an action at some point after having observed it.

PRETEND PLAY

also called fantasy play, dramatic play, or imaginary play, children use an object to represent something else.

TRANSDUCTION

Piaget’s term for a preoperational child’s tendency to mentally link particular phenomena, whether or not there is logically a causal relationship.

ANIMISM

The tendency to attribute life to objects that are not alive 

ORDINALITY

the concept of comparing quantities (more or less, bigger or smaller)—seems to begin around 9 to 11 months 

CARDINALITY

where children understand that the number of items in a set is the same regardless of how they are arranged and that the last number counted is the total number of items in the set regardless of how they are counted, starts to develop at about 2 ½ years of age.

CENTRATION

The tendency to focus on one aspect of a situation and neglect others.

DECENTER

think about several aspects of a situation at one time.

EGOCENTRISM

form of centration. 

CONSERVATION

 the fact that two things that are equal remain so if their appearance is altered, as long as nothing is added or taken away

IRREVERSIBILITY

 failure to understand that an action can go in two or more directions. 

THEORY OF MIND

the awareness of the broad range of human mental states—beliefs, intents, desires, dreams, and so forth—and the understanding that others have their own distinctive beliefs, desires, and intentions.

ENCODING

is like putting information in a folder to be filed in memory; it attaches a “code” or “label” to the information so it will be easier to find when needed. 

STORAGE

It is where the information is kept.

RETRIEVAL

information is accessed or recalled from memory storage.

SENSORY MEMORY

is a temporary storehouse for incoming sensory information.

WORKING MEMORY

a short-term storehouse for information a person is actively working on, trying to understand, remember.

LONG TERM MEMORY

Storage of virtually unlimited capacity that holds information for long periods.

PHONOLOGICAL LOOP

which aids in the processing of verbal information.

VISUO-SPATIAL SKETCHPAD

which maintains and manipulates visual information.

CENTRAL EXECUTIVE

In Baddeley’s model, element of working memory that controls the processing of information.

EXECUTIVE FUNCTION

Conscious control of thoughts, emotions, and actions to accomplish goals or solve problems.

RECOGNITION

is the ability to identify something encountered before; 

RECALL

is the ability to reproduce knowledge from memory;

GENETIC MEMORY

Memory that produces scripts of familiar routines to guide behavior.

SCRIPT

General remembered outline of a familiar, repeated event, used to guide behavior.

EPISODIC MEMORY

- refers to awareness of having experienced a particular event at a specific time and place.

AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MEMORY

a type of episodic memory, refers to memories of distinctive experiences that form a person’s life history.

SOCIAL INTERACTION MODEL

Model, based on Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory, that proposes children construct autobiographical memories through conversation with adults about shared events.

STANFORD-BINET INTELLIGENCE SCALES

Individual intelligence tests for ages 2 and up used to measure fluid reasoning, knowledge, quantitative reasoning, visual-spatial processing, and working memory.

WECHSLER PRESCHOOL AND PRIMARY SCALE OF INTELLIGENCE, REVISED (WPPSI-IV)

 Individual intelligence test for children ages 2" to 7 that yields verbal and performance scores as well as a combined score.

ZONE OF PROXIMAL DEVELOPMENT (ZPD)

Vygotsky’s term for the difference between what a child can do alone and what the child can do with help.

SCAFFOLDING

Temporary support to help a child master a task.

FAST MAPPING

Process by which a child absorbs the meaning of a new word after hearing it once or twice in conversation.

PRAGMATICS

The practical knowledge needed to use language for communicative purposes.

SOCIAL SPEECH

Speech intended to be understood by a listener.

PRIVATE SPEECH

talking aloud to oneself with no intent to communicate with others—is normal and common in childhood. 

EMERGENT LITERACY

The development of fundamental skills that eventually lead to being able to read and write.

ORAL LANGUAGE SKILLS

such as vocabulary, syntax, narrative structure, and the understanding that language is used to communicate; 

SPECIFIC PHONOLOGICAL SKILLS

 (linking letters with sounds) that help in decoding the printed word.

THE MONTESSORI METHOD

is based on the belief that children’s natural intelligence involves rational, spiritual, and empirical aspects.

THE REGGIO EMILIA APPROACH

 Teachers ask questions that draw out children’s ideas and then create flexible plans to explore these ideas with the children.

HEAD START

provides medical, dental, and mental health care; social services; and at least one hot meal a day.