The child responds to the influence of other people but is actively engaged in developing its own concept of its and others genders. Kohlberg argues that there are 3 stages through which children naturally progress as they get older and their cognitive abilities develop. Stages in the construction of gender are thought to be associated with wider stages in cognitive development. Between the ages of 2 and 3 occurs stage one, which Kohlberg named ‘gender labelling’ this is where a child recognises that he or she is a girl or boy. This is purely based on appearances; if the appearance was to change then the child would happily change the label too.
The major difference between the two is that the gender consistency theory proposes that children’s understanding of gender develops with age, whilst the gender schema theory suggests that early childhood gender development is influenced heavily by the ideas and concepts about what ‘maleness’ or ‘femaleness’ means in a particular society. According to the gender consistency theory, children go through three stages in the development of full gender identity starting from the age of 2 years old. Between 2 and 3.5 years children enter the gender identity stage, where they label themselves at present as a boy or girl Recognition of this then allows a better understanding and categorisation of the world. Through this stage children sometimes use incorrect labels for people, they also fail to recognise gender staying the same in the past or future e.g. they may believe that a person can change gender.
In the majority of cases, the child’s biological sex matches their gender and there are no problems. However, some children are born “inter-sex”; they have ambiguous genitals and are not obviously one sex or the other. Money believed that, providing that a a child’s sex is decided before their 3rd birthday, social factors are so influential that children will accept their assigned gender identity. The third year is another critical period, and because a child’s gender identity is established by then, it cannot thereafter be changed without causing the child significant psychological problems. Early research did support this hypothesis.
Outline and evaluate the cognitive explanations of gender. Martin and Halverson proposed in their gender schema theory that the development of a child’s gender is induced by their readiness to categorise gender information. This gender information is organised into schemas which are effective in organising the information as a means of using it to interpret new gender related experiences. Such interpretation will be of knowledge pertaining to gender type activities and behaviour. Where schemas are an essential aspect of Martin and Halverson’s theory, a major concern involves the lack of explanation regarding how such schemas are originally acquired.
To what extent do the ‘grand theories’ discussed in Book 1, Chapter 2 take account of the role of social experiences in child development? Throughout much of history children were often viewed as small versions of adults and little attention was paid to their cognitive, emotional, physical, social and educational growth. Today, recognising such things is essential because they can have either a positive or negative impact on a child’s development. There are four ‘grand theories’ in child development: Behaviourism, Social Learning Theory, Constructivism and Social Constructivism. They are referred to as Grand Theories because they offer explanations of child development as a whole, rather than in specific areas.
Rate is defined as... “The speed with which something moves or happens.” So as already stated development happens in the same order amongst all children but it may not happen at the same rate. For example no baby can learn to walk before it can sit up but it is not uncommon for one baby to learn to walk at 10 months and another baby will develop the skill at 18 months. The difference in these two is important because we need to recognise the sequence of development of the children or young people that you may be dealing with. Also we need to understand that the children cannot be compared to each other in terms of how they develop as each child will get there in their
1b. Suggest three reasons for gender difference in subject choice. (6 marks) • Primary socialisation – Oakley suggests gender role socialisation, i.e. boys play with masculine toys and girls play with feminine toys at an early age influences their decision to opt for certain subjects. For example, boys are more likely to choose design technology and girls are more likely to choose food technology.
Four boys for every girl is diagnosed with AS. This could be attributed to girls being able to mask their differences in social settings. Children with AS generally do not have delays in cognition or general language development. Diagnosing a child early in life and setting up an intervention plan seems to be the key with children suffering from AS. There are several different behaviors a child could display, so there is not a “typical” treatment plan for
Child Development Assignment Level 3 Outcome 1.2 Explain the difference between sequence of development and rate of development. Why is the difference important? We need to understand the areas in which a child develops Physical Development, Intellectual development, Social & Emotional Development, Moral development and Communication development and that all these are equally important as each other and do not work separately. It’s with this information we know all children follow a typical pattern development, however not all children develop at the same rate and some may not progress over all areas, which may mean they need extra help with different things. Outcome 1.1 Complete the following five tables, showing the sequence
Throughout history there have been people that produced works and findings that have aided the understanding of human behaviour, how we work, learn and interact. These theorists have created theories of works that we still use now a day to function in society and education. I have selected 3 theorists that I believe still influence education today. Piaget Before Piaget’s work, the common assumption in psychology was that children are merely less competent thinkers than adults. Piaget showed that young children think in strikingly different ways compared to adults.