Observation Paper #3

Class/section: FHS 1500-501

Your Name: Austin Wride

Assignment: Observation 3

Background Information
Child’s age: 8 years old

Fictitious name: “Maddison”

Location: Alpine, UT

Brief Descrip- An observation of “Maddison” interacting with other non-related children,

tion: some of which are her same age.

Biological Development
I had the opportunity to observe Maddison for a few hours during an afternoon while she inter-
acted with several children ranging from 1 to 7 years old. She is of average height for her age, but ap-
pears to be overweight for her age. According to Berger, “about one-third of 6- to 11-year-old children
are overweight, more than half of whom are obese (Berger, 2014, p. 247).” As I later spoke with her
family, I recognized that her parents are also overweight. I suspect that there are probably genetic
and/or lifestyle factors contributing to her body habitus. Despite being overweight, I am unable to de-
tect any other health conditions that she may have.
She appears to have excellent motor skills and was excited to run and play with the other chil-
dren. She had no difficulty climbing a small rock wall, walking up or down stairs or going down a slide.
When it came time for a craft, she was very delicate with the small objects and seemed to have great
fine motor skills. While having snacks, she required no adult help and even offered to help some of the
other children as they were getting their food. Berger states that during this stage of childhood, “self-
care is easy” and I believe that Maddison is a great example of that (Berger, 2014, p. 244).
Between the ages of 6 and 11 years old, “growth is slow and steady (Berger, 2014, p.244).”
Based on this statement, I would not expect any sudden growth spurts to happen until she is closer to
12 years of age. During this time, I believe she should focus on including more playful exercise into her
life. Potential playful exercises include recess at school, sports such as tennis, basketball, baseball and
volleyball, and dance. She may even find that her enthusiasm to increase her physical activity could
have a positive influence on the health of her family members.

Cognitive Development
 Maddison is a very social girl who has a lot to say. Her vocabulary seems right on par or slightly
advanced for her age; however she has a form of speech impediment. According to Berger, children of
this age can learn as many as 20 new words a day and are able to correctly use complex grammar rules.
She expounds by saying, “by age 6, children know the names of thousands of objects, and they use
many parts of speech—adjectives and adverbs, as well as nouns and verbs (Berger, 2014 p. 259).” I am
amazed at how well children of this age are able to learn language skills and improve the understand-
ing that they already had.
As Maddison was playing with the children, I heard her describe in detail the events that lead
up to her grandmother’s passing that occurred approximately a year ago. She was acutely aware of the
specifics and it appeared that she had told the story multiple times before. I believe that her repeating
the story has helped her recall those very specific details. As stated in Invitation to the Life Span, “chil-
dren realize that some things should be remembered, and they begin to use simple strategies, primar-
ily rehearsal (repeating an item again and again). This is not a very efficient strategy, but with enough
repetition, automatization occurs (Berger, 2014, p. 257).” I would expect that over the course of the
next few years, she will further develop her abilities to remember things and it will be in more efficient
ways.
Maddison appears to have an excellent ability to learn and seems to be free of any special
needs relating to leaning such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity, bipolar, disruptive mood dysregula-
tion, or autism. From the textbook, I have learned that “Many children have a specific learning disorder
that leads to difficulty in mastering a particular skill that other people acquire easily. Indeed, according
to Gardner’s view of multiple intelligences, almost everyone has a specific inadequacy or two (Berger,
2014, p. 274).”

Psychosocial Development
During my time with Maddison, I was able to see quite a robust amount of interaction between
her and the other children. She was very aware of them and had a special interest in ensuring their in-
volvement in the fun. She was willing to share the things she was playing with and encouraged them to
climb and play along with her. Her emotions seemed to be very well regulated and she expressed a lot
of joy playing with her playmates. Her attention was directed towards the younger children and she
took on somewhat of a big sister role when interacting with them. She appears to have a healthy level
of self-esteem. Berger points out that “children develop feelings of self-esteem, competence, and indi-
viduality during middle childhood as they begin comparing themselves with peers (Berger, 2014, p.
286.” It did cause me to wonder if her strong self-esteem is more apparent because she seemed to fo-
cus on playing with younger children. I would be interested in evaluating her level of self-esteem in a
situation where there are only children of her same age.
Based on the conversation that she had concerning the passing of her grandmother, she seems
to have a strong social support through her family as well as a developed religious faith. Both of these
factors indicate that she has a relatively high ability to deal with stress in her life (Berger, 2014, p. 289).
Her family structure seems to be very stable and she expresses excitement to be moving across town
with her family to a different home. She appears to be very close to her brothers and has the support
from her parents. I believe that this support system is extremely important in the psychosocial devel-
opment of a young child such as Maddison and I would hope that every child would have the same
benefits.
Reference List

Berger, K. S. (2014). Invitation to the life span (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Worth Publishers.