Physical development is something that we all experience within our lifetime. Infancy/toddlerhood, early childhood, middle childhood, and adolescent are the stages before becoming a young adult. The following will give examples of each stage of our young lives, while also providing motor development in that proprietary stage. There will also be information pertaining to nature and nurture within these stages, and whether or not they can affect motor development. Each one of us develops differently, because none of us come with owners’ manuals when we are born. This leaves development up to our parents during infancy/toddlerhood, and even all the way up to adolescent.
Infancy/toddlerhood is our first stage of life, where we grow at an exceptional rate. We tend to grow in bursts rather than at a steady constant rate like we do as early childhood. According to Laura Berk, some babies can go anywhere from 7-63 days without growing, but then almost growing a half of an inch within a 24-hour timeframe (Berk, 2021). An example of motor development is in the fine motor skills, dealing with grasping things. This progresses in a very fast rate, where they can barely grab anything, to doing the pincer grip to pick up small items. Nature is just about the same for every baby in this stage, with growing to certain lengths and weights all within a close proximity. However, nurture can have a huge impact, especially if the mother isn’t able to breast feed for a good duration of time. Of course, there is formula, and it helps with physical development, but colostrum is an important ingredient for a baby’s immune system, and cognitive development.
Early childhood is the next stage of growth, where all sorts of physical and mental growth happen. According to Laura Berk, between the age’s two and six, our bodies develop 45 new epiphyses, or growth centers where cartilage harden into bones (Berk, 2021). This is when doctors can determine a child’s skeletal age by looking at these growth centers where they can determine any growth diseases. An example of motor development in this stage is would be jumping, hopping, or skipping since their center of gravity is a lot better than in the past. Having the ability to walk incorporates a whole new set of gross-motor skills within a short amount of time. Laura Berk states, that heredity plays a huge part in development during this stage since the pituitary gland emphasizes the bodies’ ability and sensitivity to growth hormones (Berk, 2021). With nurture, it would be impacted by how and what the parents feed the child. Malnutrition is solemnly based on the parents to the child, with geodemographics playing a role as well.
Next is the middle childhood stage that ranges from age six to 11. According to Laura Berk, children tend to add five pounds and two-three inches of height every year during this stage (Berk, 2021). Growth isn’t as spectacular in this stage as it is in the earlier stages, with them growing a slower/steady pace. Their motor development is quite exceptional in this stage, giving them the ability to become more agile and faster with gross-motor skills. This is the time where some children are introduced to all kinds of different sports. Both heredity and environment influence physical growth in this stage, pertaining to where the child is born. Laura Berk States that there is a large height difference between children born in America, and those that are born in Africa (Berk, 2021). Later, in the middle childhood years, they can begin to fend for themselves and find their own food within the house. So, providing good healthy foods in the home can give them that ability to choose from junk food and healthy foods. Broken homes tend to affect children during this stage, since they are beginning to learn their emotions.
The final stage is adolescent years, where their age is anything between 12 years old; all the way through their teenage years. This is the transformation from childhood years to early adulthood, where puberty begins to come into play. This is typically where most of the long-term growth happens for the reason of puberty alone. Puberty is where the child’s body is flooded with specific hormones, testosterone for boys, and estrogen for females. Males begin growing hair all over their body and expand their muscular strength to new heights. While females begin filling out their clothes more in the thigh, butt, and bosom area.
Motor development again is shooting through the roof where they can begin fine tuning their movements in all areas. Heredity and environment affect physical growth in their own particular way. According to Laura Berk, sexual maturation and self-esteem issues can affect how an adolescent grows, especially with their sport involvement (Berk, 2021). According to a study done with adolescents, physical growth is closely affected with the development of the brain, especially in the cerebral cortex (Pejović-Milovančević, et. al., 2017). This is where the heredity impact comes into play, with genes playing a huge role on when the child reaches the maturation stage. This also contributes to why some adolescents are impulsive and have a level of immaturity since the prefrontal cortex is the last to develop.
In conclusion, there comes a lot of physical and mental changes as we grow through infancy/toddlerhood, all the way up to late adolescent. Each one of these stages plays its own very important role in how we develop our motor skills and our mental capacities. With nature and nurture playing another very important role in a child’s development. We must put everything into consideration when raising our children, since we are the ones that kick start their lives. We must create our child’s owner manual as they begin to cross between growth stages, where it begins to get easier with the more children we have. Physical development stems from our part of 23 chromosomes within our children, incorporated with the way we bring them to age.
-Cyral I Callender III
References
Berk, L. E. (2021). Infants, Children, and Adolescents (9th Edition). Pearson Education (US). https://purdueuniversityglobal.vitalsource.com/books/9780135494271
Pejović-Milovančević Milica, Krgović Ivan, & Mitković-Vončina Marija. (2017). The adolescent brain: Changes and challenges of development. Medicinski Podmladak, 68(2), 8–13.
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