Childhood Development StagesChildhood development stages are a topic of much debate among experts and parents alike. Personally I have met many parents that stress and worry about the development of their child. Most of the time the worry is based on some skewed viewpoint by some obscure, rogue expert that wants to promote some new method, drug or course. It seems there is no standardised guideline for childhood development stages. There are so many views and interpretations that have a rather radical range. Some experts look at a certain child and say she is fine while another expert looks at the same child and says she has some serious developmental issues and needs medication. The point is, you need to look at the motivation behind the “expert” that is describing the developmental stages. My motivation is to provide a bit of insight to parents, teachers and others dealing with children of all ages. I want people to draw their own conclusions first and understand that all kids are different, there is no one size fits all definition. Children go through many stages of development. Often it can seem as if a child is lagging behind. My wife was often worried about the development of our daughter. This was based on poorly educated people saying that she should be doing other things by certain ages. As it turns out, she was above average in most areas and in some areas she was developing much faster than other kids.
When a child develops from a baby they generally have a tendency toward either speech development or motor development. You will generally find a child who speaks relatively young is slower to learn to walk and vice versa. This may appear as if a child is not developing in certain areas. There is a reason for this… When a child first learns how to do basic things like walk and talk they need to make neurological connections to do so. As they develop they have a dominant portion of their brain working. The ones who tend to speak early simply have a brain that develops in that region sooner. The same applies for kids who learn to walk early. A child cannot develop all aspects and skills at the same pace, their brain would simply not keep up. Childhood Development StagesThere are many definitions of childhood development stages. Each expert seems to have a different view. Here I am describing childhood development stages from my own research. This is a personal definition of them based on many years of human developmental research an experience. Don’t take these stages as universal and official. Primal Stage The primal stage of development is when a child is acting on instinct like an animal. The baby cries when he is hungry, gets a fright at loud noises, sleeps most of the day and relies exclusively on his parents for survival. At this stage of development the child is learning how to get his most basic needs met. There are no real reasoning skills at this stage of development, the child simply acts on instinct and what his brain perceives as a way to meet primal needs. This stage usually occurs from birth to about 3 -5 months. During this stage the primary focus is growth and survival. The baby doesn’t care about trivial things, he has no interests, he doesn’t speak, he just eats, poops and sleeps. Imprint Stage The imprint stage is where a child begins to learn functions other than mere survival. It’s called the imprint stage because at this stage the child is like one big sponge, she is soaking up every piece of information that comes at her. At this stage the child is learning things from parents, other kids and anything they come into contact with. It is at this stage that a child learns key values and starts developing tendencies to certain skills and character traits. These skills and character traits are exclusively a product of their environment. The child at this stage is a little version of their parents. The imprint stage generally starts from birth, so it overlaps the primal stage, but it doesn’t start taking shape until about three months. This stage goes all the way to about seven years of age. Up until then it is critical that the child is being imprinted with the right things, this is why the parental favourite saying of “do as I say, not as I do” is crap. Of course a child will do as you do, it holds more weight than words. After all, if it’s good enough for you then it’s good enough for the child. That’s how they will see it. Modeling and Strategy Stage Among the stages of childhood development, this one is the determining factor of a child’s adult character traits, skill-set and overall cognitive profile. At this stage the child/teen finds heroes and role models and wants to be like them. They become interested in sports, music, movies etc. They want to be like their heroes. Kids at this stage also find people they know like uncles, aunties, friends and even their parents and they set out to model the strategies these role models use to produce certain results. At this stage a child will show preference for specific things. This is when a child chooses a specific sport or pastime and generally doesn’t stray too far from that throughout the rest of his or her life. This stage starts at about age seven and lasts until mid to late teens, generally about 15 - 16. At this stage a child will have many unconscious strategies for getting certain things done, all of which are based on role models and heroes. After these three stage the childhood development stages become adult development stages, of which there are several. It is throughout these three early childhood development stages that a child becomes who they are for the rest of their life. It is of utmost importance that a child is provided with the best start in life throughout all of these stages. Children who develop with sub-par influence are the ones who become adults in therapy, taking medication and experiencing many of life’s worst problems. Once the childhood development stages are over it becomes more difficult to mould a person (although not impossible). These three childhood development stages are extracted from my own research and experience dealing with human development and potential. They are not the universal definition of childhood development, however they provide a great insight into how a person becomes who they are later in life. My motivation is to reach you as a parent, teacher or other expert dealing with children and give you a clear reason to carefully structure the way in which you interact with and around the kids you deal with. Return to our home page from childhood development stages
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