Emotional development is development of a child’s ability to control her/his feelings – is influenced by the child’s inborn temperament, her environment and her state of health.
Social Development
Social development – socialisation – is the process of learning skills and attitudes, which enable individuals to live easily with other members of their community.
Social development follows similar patterns all over the world although social customs vary in different countries and even between different groups in the same country.
Activities, which encourage social development, are those, which bring a child into company of other people both inside and outside the home:
- Family outings
- Parent and toddler groups
- Playgroups and nursery schools
- Opportunities to play with friends.
Discovery Play
This type of play enables a child to find out about things: what are they like – their shape, size, texture, colour; how they are made; what she/he can do with them. The child will also discover that they can be broken, and this can help to teach him/her to take care of their possessions.
Physical Play
This type of play takes place when a child is actively moving around – running, throwing a ball, jumping, climbing, crawling, balancing, swinging and so on.
Creative Play
Creative play is when a child expresses their own ideas and feelings to make something which is original, for example, a picture, an animal modelling dough, a house in building blocks, and so on. A young child is able to express feelings and ideas more easily by painting and drawing than by using words. As the child becomes more skilled with words, they may then be able to write a story, play or poem.
Imaginative Play
This type off play is ‘pretend’ or fantasy play. The child imagines that they are someone else or an animal such as a rabbit or dog. Children imitate the ways adults when playing in a Wendy house or play ‘shopping’. Attempting to behave like someone else helps the child to understand more clearly the ways other people behave.
Manipulative Play
This involves skilful use of the hands. During manipulative play the hands, eyes and brain are being trained to co-ordinate that is to work smoothly together. Babies become increasingly skilful with their hands as they play rattles, soft toys and other objects. Later on, they benefit from playing with such things as water, sand and modelling dough.
Social play
This takes place when children play together. It teaches them to co-operate, to share and to be honest. It also teaches them that antisocial behaviour, like cheating, leads to isolation and loss of friendship. Children often quarrel and in doing so learn about each other’s reactions.
One of the most important things children do is play. Play is the essential joy of childhood and are also the way children learning about themselves, their environment and the people around them. As they play, children learn to solve problems, get along with other people and control their bodies as they improve their creativity and develop leadership skills. When children play with a broad variety of toys, the experiences help them to develop to their fullest prospective.
Children bring endless amount of energy and imagination to their play with toys and constantly developing new and creative ways to play because there are so many different kinds of toys and novel way to play with them, children learn that the world is a diverse place with unlimited possibilities. Toys have an exciting role in helping children to become mature, confident and imaginative adults.
May toys are used only during a particular stage of development. However, a few seem to appeal to children of all ages and are used over a long period of childhood. These include bricks, climbing frames, dolls and soft toys, and toys for bath time.
Bricks:
Bricks probably have the longest life of any toy, building with bricks encourages children to concentrate, be patient, to invent and to be skilful with their hands.
When a young child first plays with bricks, they have difficulty in placing one brick on top of another. They have to learn to use their hands and eyes together, to develop fine control, to concentrate and to carry on and keep on practising until the bricks can be placed how they want it to be.
Climbing Frame:
This large and expensive toy takes up a great deal of space and, once put up, has to be left in a place. The advantages of a climbing frame are that it can be used throughout childhood both from physical play and for many other activities. It can be put wherever there is enough space, either inside or outside the house.
A climbing frame is particularly useful for children who do not have a large garden or nearby adventure playground in which to play. It gives opportunity for children to use their muscles, gain control over their movements, test their skills and use up energy. A young child has to decide where to put their hands and feet, how far to climb and how to hold the body to balance.
Dolls and Soft Toys:
The favourite doll or teddy or cuddly animal becomes a sort of ‘person’ to whom the child can turn for companionship or comfort. Unlike people, they are always ready for play, do not make demands, can be talked to in confidence and then left alone until wanted again. Sometimes children prefer to share grief, anger, and pleasure with dolly or teddy rather than with people. Many children rely on them for comfort throughout childhood.
Toys for Bath time:
Children love playing with water and have fun with toys, which float, sponges for squeezing, and containers for scooping water up with. One way of getting children to wash themselves all over or to have their hair washed at bath time is a promise to give them time afterwards to play in the water. Supervision of children in a bath continues to be needed for safety reasons.
I sent of letters to different companies of toy manufactures and toyshops and other places to find out information about play, most of the companies I wrote too, replied with letters and leaflets and booklets. A copy of the letter is shown below:
14 Hornby Crescent
Clock Face
St Helens
Merseyside
WA9 4RY
Dear sir/madam,
I am currently studying for my GCSEs in childcare and I was wondering if there was any chance you could help me to do my research on Toys and Play. I attend Sutton High Sports College and I am doing my work on Toys and Play is there a possibility you could send me any information you have on these subjects. I will be very grateful.
Thanks a lot for your time
Jill Mercer
I sent letters to the following companies:
Toys r us ☺
Early learning centre ☺
Pann ☺
Lego ☺
Mother Care ☺
National Action plan
Mother and Babies
My emails were wrote in the same way and I send those too:
Mother Care ☺
Baby world
Toys r us ☺
Early Learning Centre ☺
And to other email address off links on Internet programs
☺ - means they replied to my letter/email.
Identification of Focused Area of Research.
From my initial visit to Alanya, I have discovered that she is a friendly child who likes to play with other children. She enjoys dressing up and playing with her dolls and other toys.
Alanya likes to play with other girls and boys because she has got a twin brother who she plays with a lot. She likes drawing and other creative activities; she likes playing with play dough and modelling things with it.
Alanya plays all the time after school, so its very important to her and her everyday lifestyle, so that’s why I chose play as my broad area of research I have now realised that for my focused area of research I’m going to study PHYSICAL PLAY, cause Alanya seems to do more creative, imaginative and co operative play, so I’m going to study Alanya’s physical play and she how she reacts to the outdoors like in parks etc.
A spider diagram to show the different types of physical play.
The things I’m going to look at in PHYSICAL PLAY are:
- Physical play as a whole
- The things that my child should be able to do at her age
- Benefits of physical play
- Activities
- Toys for physical play
Although most play is Physical in someway, physical play takes place where children are using their whole bodies, and their large muscles. It is usually very active, and involves lots of running around allowing children to use up all their energy. It usually takes place out of doors as lots of space is needed.
Physical helps children by:
- Developing fine motor skills
- Developing balance and co ordination
- Developing senses – sight, touch, taste, smell and hear
- Exercise body and limbs
The things that relate to a child aged 4:
Gross motor skills.
- Can walk or run alone up and down the stairs
- Can walk along a straight line
- Hops on one foot
- Climbs ladders and trees
- Pedals and controls a tricycle confidently
- Is becoming increasingly skilled at ball games – can throw, catch, bounce, kick and use a bat.
Fine motor skills.
- Can build a tower of ten or more cubes
- Can build 3 steps with 6 bricks if shown
- Controls a pencil with a mature pincer grasp
- Can fasten and unfasten buttons
- Can put together simple and large piece jigsaws
Benefits of physical play.
Physical play encourages children to:
- Have fun and be happy
- Develops fine motor skills
- Develops large motor skills
- Learns new skills
- Relieve stressful situations
- Divert aggression
- Co operate with others
- Use their imagination
Activities for physical play are:
- Playing hopscotch/skipping
- Playing team games such as football
- Playing on slides, swings, climbing frames
- Riding bicycles and tricycles
- Roller-blading
- Swimming
Physical play helps the development of Gross Motor skills, co-ordination and balance, as well as fine motor skills it can help to develop concepts of size, speed and spatial awareness, as well as helping them to learn about the outside world when children are playing together. It will encourage language development and social development - taking turns, sharing. Emotionally it helps children `Let off steam`, boost self- confidence and be adventurous.
Visit 1
Date of visit: 09.10.2002
Time: 18.00 – 20.00
Age: 4 years and 4 months
Place: At my house
People present: Alanya, Cameron and me.
Aim of visit
Today I’m going to observe Alanya when making Bill and Ben biscuits with her and her brother.
I’m going to be looking at her intellectual development when I’m telling her the instructions. I’m also going to look at her, social skills to see how she communicates with her brother and me. I’m obviously going to look at her physical skills in making the biscuits. Emotional development comes into it slightly in her confidence and ability to cope with the new situations.
Expectations of the visit
I think she will understand what she has to do though when I’m in the kitchen with her and I think she will stand and listen to what she is told to do. She will also do it properly when she is told to do it and if she gets stuck she will no doubt ask for help. I’m also going to do them with her brother and see can they work together and share things and help one another.
Observations
When I went to visit Annie she was very excited when I told her what we was making, she followed the instructions clear, but when she found it hard to mix the ingredients together when it was getting sticky and more hard so mix. Her brother made them with her and they shared the equipment and helped one another. They copied of the box to see how they should decorate them and they followed it well, the made a Bill and a Ben each and they counted how many they had made. Alanya asked could we make them again one day, so it shows that she enjoyed making them. She is good at using her hands and co-ordinating with hands, fingers and brain.
I told her that they will be ten minutes to cook and she told me when 10 minutes had gone, so it proves that she has a good sense of maths and numbers, I explained to her though that they will be ready when the big finger reaches such a number and then she told me when it got there.
Evaluations of visit
I was practically correct in my expectations because I know the child pretty well so I know what I expect from her. She was well behaved like I said she would be in the expectations. She likes to bake cakes and I she has asked me could she do them again in the next school holidays because she enjoyed it so much.
She was more excited than I expected her too be and I think that was because it was her first time to make them and she knew that she could eat the afterwards and she likes cakes and biscuits. Compared to Cameron Alanya is very loud compared too him. I think this might have had something about what we were doing because he isn’t usually a quiet child as he is the nosiest out of the two of them. He was able to do the same things as she was just not as confidently and I think this has something to do with their sex because Cameron probably doesn’t think that making biscuits is a boyish thing. Cameron is a child that only does boyish things and thinks it will be wrong to play with a doll or play with Barbie’s or something along those lines.
Emotional Development
Alanya was happy making cakes and enjoyed it very much; her expressions on her were showing happiness and enjoyment.
Social Development
Alanya got on well with her brother and me and talked a lot and didn’t want to do it on her own, she wanted to share everything and wanted to help her brother if he was struggling.
Intellectual Development
Alanya’s intellectual development didn’t play much of a big part in this visit but when it did she used it well when talking to Cameron and me with her language skills, which are brilliant for a four year old, and her hand eye co ordination was also brilliant.
Physical Development
Alanya used her fine manipulative and gross motor skills in baking the cakes as she was mixing and picking the stars up to still on the icing of the cakes and all so the jelly sweets to stick on as well.
Visit 2
Date of visit: 28.10.2002
Time of visit: 12. 30 – 14.00
Age: 4 years and 5 months
Place: Sherdley park play area
People present: Alanya and me
Aims and planning
Today, I’m going to take Alanya to the park, I’m going to take Alanya on her own without her brother and see how she reacts with other children and see does she communicate with them and talk to them, or does she ignore them and just play alone (solitary) because she is either shy or wants to do her own things.
I’m also going to see does Alanya have any major skills that she is good at like balancing and skipping and running and climbing up the fake walls in the park (gross motor skills) and then co ordination of using her arms and legs along the ropes and see can she use her own imagination and do things by herself.
Expectations
I expect that Alanya will be able to run, jump, hop and skip, walk along a beam, enjoy climbing and sliding down the slide.
I think that she will enjoy running around and having a bit of freedom to play on what she wants to at the park.
FAR investigation
When I return to Alanya’s house I hope to talk to Alanya’s parents about their views on the importance of play and how they encourage this in Alanya. I have planned a simple questionnaire for them to complete while I’m at the park with Alanya. I then hope to interview them and ask them a few more questions.
FAR predictions
I think that I may find that Alanya’s parents will find physical play important to her lifestyle. I don’t think they find it as important as they should do because she is more imaginative and creative, and she is always playing with toys in her toy room with her brother.
Observations
When I arrived at Alanya’s house she and Cameran came running up to me because they haven't seen me for a couple of weeks because they have been on holiday. I told Alanya that I was going to take her to the park and I brought Cameran a game for him to play then he didn’t get jealous of me taking Alanya and not him aswell. Alanya became excited when I told her that I was taking her to the park. The park isn’t far from Alanya’s house so we walked it there and when we was on the way she held my hand and she was skipping and running on the way there. When we got to the park Alanya wanted to go on a swing straight away and she ran straight over to it, she was on the swing for about 10 minutes and she need me to start her off pushing her then she used her legs to make her keep moving.
Alanya then went on the climbing frame were she was climbing up a fake wall, I had to tell her where to put her foot as she got a bit stuck when she was near the top of the wall. When she got to the top she had to slide down at the other side and she did that with no problem at all. She then did that a few times and once she had done it a few times she didn’t need help with co ordination and where to put her feet etc.
She then played on the see saw with another girl on the other side, but she knew the girl from primary school so she had a friend there that she was communicating with. She then went on the roundabout, I pushed her round on it and when she got dizzy she asked me to stop. She then wanted to go for a kick about in the park with her friend so she started to kick the ball about the park with her friend and it was as though she forgot I was there, she was happy playing with her friend though. I was talking to her friends mum about her little girl and asking how often does she bring her here to the park etc.
Alanya then got fed up with doing that and she wanted to go home to play with Cameran, so we walked home and when we got home she started to play with Cameran and it wasn’t long before she fell asleep it shows that taking her to the park and letting her do her own things makes her tired and then she will sleep.
When we got back and Alanya was playing with her toys, I was able to talk to her mum and dad about my focused area of research and ask them questions.
Evaluation
Alanya was well behaved on this visit to the park and I think with her friend been there was a boost upwards to build up her confidence even more because otherwise she would off been shy. When I was listening to Alanya and her friend they have the same type of skills both like the same things and both seem at the same stage off development the one thing I did notice about Alanya’s friend was that she seemed to have a speech problem she didn’t pronounce all her words correctly compared to how Alanya pronounced hers.
Social Development
I noticed that Alanya having a friend that she knew at the park made and helped her socialise with people, if her friend wasn’t there I think she would have been fed up earlier and she wouldn’t off talked to anyone. Alanya was happy at the park and she enjoyed it very much, I think she will go again and next time we will take her brother.
Emotional Development
I think Alanya was happy that she didn’t go the park with Cameran but I think she missed him been there, because she had no one to play with until her friend came. I think she is close to her brother and she likes him been around.
Intellectual Development
I couldn’t really study many aspects of Emily’s intellectual development from this visit. I noticed that her language is well developed though and her speech was completely understandable, and that she does ask things if needed and if she says something wrong she will correct herself.
Physical Development
I managed to study Alanya’s physical development, especially her motor skills in a lot of this visit.
When she used her arms and legs on the fake wall and when she used her legs to push herself on the swing. She is very strong in her arms and legs to pull her up on the wall and strong in legs to support her on the wall and to use her legs on the wall.
She can skip which she was doing on the way to the park she can run about a lot.
She can even use co ordination and kick a ball in a straight line, and she knows to place her foot at the side of the ball and which ever way her foot next to the ball is facing is the way the ball will go, this shows that when people tell her things she remembers them and then she can explain them to other people. I think she learnt that off her dad when he has taught her little brother.
Conclusion
I think Alanya’s visit went well. I was a bit worried about how she would react with out taking Cameran and how Cameran would react with out me taking him with us. Alanya was very co operative and a very exciting child and she enjoyed her time at the park.
I also was able to study the aspects of Alanya’s development, which I wanted on the visit to the park. I observed her using gross motor skills at the park, which seemed to manage quite well and in which she fitted the theory I had discovered.
I also looked at her emotional and social development and they was a expected but I think she was more shy than I thought she would be, she seemed very clingy until her friend came. I think if her brother were there we would off seen a different side to her. She doesn’t like been on her own with people she doesn’t know she likes to be with people her age and people she knows or has seen before.
Far Assignment
I gave Alanya’s mum and dad a questionnaire to complete while we were at the park (see below)
When we returned I interviewed both parents and asked them the following questions:
- Does Alanya enjoy outdoor activities?
- Which activities do you think she enjoys the most/least?
- How do you encourage her outdoor play and how do you get involved?
- Do you think it is important for children to have lots of play outdoors as well as indoors?
Questionnaire
- Which of the following does Alanya do:
- Which of the following outdoor toys do you have for your children to use? Please tick
Results of the interview
Evaluation of FARs Activities
I feel I gained a lot of information that is very useful to my research topic. I have learnt a lot about Alanya and her lifestyle and what her parents think of play as a whole. From the questionnaire I found out that Alanya does go outdoors quite a lot but she prefers the indoors because it is warmer and she doesn’t like to go outside in the cold to often.
She likes to play with toys outside that are big and more exciting than riding a bike or something like that. She also likes to play with footballs and kick them about, maybe that is just because she has been brought with her brother playing football or she has decided to choose to do that herself.
From the questionnaire I found out that, Alanya’s family have bought Alanya and Cameran a lot of outdoors toys such as:
Swings, Bicycles, Balls, Sandpit, Paddling pool, Slide, Climbing Frame and they have a see saw, Tent and tunnel ball pool, and a bouncy castle, they have a set of football posts which is for Cameran.
It seems from the questionnaire that Alanya has her fair share of outdoors and indoor activities its just that she likes the indoors more, probably something to do with the weather or something to do with she would rather be more creative.
This whole thing I think has something to do with the sex’s of the twins as one been a girl and the other been a boy. I think Chris thinks that Cameron can only do boyish stuff and it’s not right for him to play with girl’s toys. I think Cameron is the same as Chris because he picked a blue room when he wanted it decorating and Alanya picked a pink room, this could have something to do with they have been told that pink is for girls and blue is for boys or something like that. But with Alanya and Cameron been different sex’s they have probably been brought up in slightly different ways, like Cameron football, Alanya dolls and Barbie’s.
Visit 6
Date: 16th February 2003
Time: 12.30 till 14.00
Age: 4 years and 9 months
Place: Sherdley park play area
People present: Alanya and Me
Aim of the visit
Today I’m going to observe Alanya’s skills in the park yet again, because I’m going to see how and whether they have changed over the past four months.
I will observe her gross motor skills by taking her to park and observe what she can do, that she couldn’t do last time and whether she choose different ways to use the equipment.
Expectations
I expect Alanya’s skills to have changed a bit; by the way she acts in the park and uses the equipment. I don’t think they will have changed dramatically as she has not been able to go to the park because it has been too cold over Christmas and too moody to go etc. I think that she will have changed in the way she plays by using her muscles and really trying for it and using her Gross motor skills as much as she can.
FAR investigation
Whilst I’m at the park, I’m going to carry out a survey at the local playground. I’m going to look at the safety aspects and compare it to what it should be like. I have got the information from for the safety regulations and the equipment and how it helps children’s development.
FAR Prediction
I think that the playground at Sherdley Park is going to be a good park and compare well with the safety aspects because it has recently been done up and its got all soft surfaces to it etc.
Observations
When I took Alanya to the park she was rather excited as I think she was glad to get out of the house for a bit because she hasn’t been out much since Christmas because its too cold to go out really and do things.
Anyway when we got to the park there was quite a lot of children there with adults, it was quite busy for a Sunday, as you don’t expect many people to go to the park. It was quite a warm Sunday so that’s probably why they went. When Alanya went through the park gate she just ran towards the roundabout and jumped on it with few other children, and one of the children’s parents was turning it so it give me a chance to observe the park and get a few notes down for my FAR research. Once Alanya got off the round about she went on to Play Frame, which consists of a slide, fireman’s pool, climbing room, stairs, fake wall, monkey bars, tunnel and a bridge. She climbed up the steps at first and slid down the slide. She then climbed back up the fake wall and over the top onto the platform she then walked over the bridge where you come to the monkey bars and because she isn’t strong enough yet to support herself in her arms. I got hold of her legs and carried her across to the other side, at the other side is a fireman’s pole, she didn’t really know how to use it but I taught her and she slid down it and decided she wanted to go onto the swings. She uses the older swings, as she is too old now to go in the baby swings, so she can start herself on the swings because she uses the floor to push herself with and then she uses her legs to swing backwards and forwards and gains height.
Alanya then went on to the see saw with another little boy at the other end, the little boy seemed younger than her so she didn’t bounce high because she didn’t want him to fall off, and hurt himself. She then went on the climbing frame she climbed that easily.
We went to the shop on the way home and Alanya looked round the shop for some sweets when we was going round the shop she noticed Easter eggs and her birthday is near Easter and she said to me ‘ its nearly my birthday isn’t it Jill’ And I just agreed I said its not too far off.
When in the shop she was telling me what she likes and what she doesn’t like and why she doesn’t like it. In the end she decided to pick milky buttons to eat and I got Cameran a packet as well. She ate them on the way home because she said she was hungry, she also got a drink of blackcurrant in the shop because she had done all that running round she was thirsty, she isn’t allowed orange because she gets hyper from it.
Evaluation
Social Development
I have noticed that once again Alanya has helped me a lot with my child care research and she has had a good day as she was telling me all about it on the way home and how much she likes going to the park. She seems to get on with me pretty well and she seems to get on with other children as well. Social development wasn’t that much of a big part in Alanya’s observation today as I was just looking at her gross motor skills mostly.
Emotional Development
Alanya showed me that she has had a good day and that she enjoys the park a lot, you could tell by the way she kept smiling and looking at everyone etc. She also enjoyed it because she was talking about it on the way home.
Intellectual Development
I could not really study many aspects of Alanya’s intellectual development from this visit. I noticed again that her language was well developed and her speech was clear and understandable.
Physical Development
I managed to study Alanya’s development, especially her gross motor skills which I was looking upon in particular because I was seeing how they have changed over the past four months. I noticed that Alanya’s self confidence has grew a lot in the past four months and that she has changed how she acts with the equipment in the park, her confidence has probably come from her swimming lesson and with her been confident in the water, it has probably boosted her confidence in a whole. Alanya used her gross motor skills a lot, and I could see a quite a difference in the way she uses the equipment than last time, in the way she climbed the fake wall was different to last time but she remembered where she had to place her feet and arms, and she got up herself. On the swings she can use her legs a lot more and she gets higher quicker because of the strength in her legs.
Conclusion
Once again I think that my visit went well. I thought she would have changed her skills but not as much as she did. She was also more talkative than last time and seemed a lot keener on the apparatus. She is an intelligent child and has a good range of imagination. She has a lot more ability that what she shows and her confidence is growing each time. Alanya co operates well with many people and she is a friendly child.
I was able to study the aspects of Alanya’s development, which I wanted too, I mostly observed the Gross motor skills of her which she seemed to manage very well and in which she fitted my expectations.
FAR assignment
I did a survey on the park and how it’s safety compared to the original safety of rospa.com, I also looked at the park apparatus and what age is best suited and how it helps to develop a child’s skills.
This survey (below) is a survey of which I found on the website of a playground safety and its good points and bad points the link is: , which I used because it is an actual link to rate your playground.
☺ - yes it was suitable
YES NO
Scoring: For every YES, your playground receives one point. Add up the number of points for each section.
This is a useful survey as it gives you a good mark scheme at the end and tells you how suitable the park is for children and how and what needs improving if anything.
When I used this survey to do my investigation it scored 20 out of a possible 24, which is pretty good, as you can see from the mark scheme it got an A. If I did this park a year or two ago it would off been really low and probably not safe to play on because it use to have massive concrete stumps on it and the surfaces use to be concrete before they did it all up last year.
This park is a good park and that’s why it scored 20 out of 23, it is in the middle of a big area, and holds many shows throughout the year, it also has a children’s pet corner which is small but has lots of animals.
There is plenty of open space for children to run around and play sports and enjoy themselves and helps them in many ways of development.
Final Evaluation
Physical Development.
Since I began my visits in September Alanya has grew 2cms, but according to the child development book by P.Minett she is still the right height for her age. Alanya’s fine manipulative skills and hand – eye coordination has improved over the period of my study. In Alanya’s visits she has increased her hand-eye coordination and her language skills, she has a very large vocabulary and she knows a wide range of spellings. She knows most of the basic stuff like the alphabet letters A-Z, Numbers 1 to 50, counts in 10s to 100 count in 20s to 100. She can also write and spell her own name.
Alanya’s gross motor skills are very good when at the park and making cookies. In visit 2 and 6 when I took Alanya to the park, I observed that Alanya had a good sense of balance developing and she was able to walk, skip, jump, which is average for her to do this according to the (*) book.
She can walk and run upstairs in an adult fashion. She can ride a tricycle confidently and she uses the pedals on it. She can catch and throw and kick a ball, which is the level of ball skills she should be up to at her age. Overall I would say Alanya’s Physical development was a lot better than I expected it to be because she would rather play inside and do creative things, so I didn’t think she would be too confident in the park and swimming etc. But she proved me wrong, as she is confident. She uses her Gross motor skills how she is supposing too.
Her fine motor skills was good as well and she gets these from playing indoors so I expected these to be good anyway. She can control a pencil with a mature pincer grasp. She can also fasten and unfasten zips and buttons and tie her own shoelaces. She showed me that when we went the swimming baths and when we was getting ready to go the park and coming home from the park etc.
Intellectual Development
Alanya is a chatty girl but can be shy at times, but when we was on our visits she was very chatty and she kept telling me lots of stories. She asked lots of questions and told me about what she does in school. She is good at reading some words but other words she makes up and just guesses what it says sometimes it is right and other times it is wrong but it shows she is confident about trying and attempting to try new things.
She has a very extensive vocabulary. She can say her sentences but sometimes gets mixed up when saying some words. Her speech is more or less grammatically correct and she enjoys telling long stories but sometimes gets confused.
Alanya has a good knowledge and she remembers things very well, her understanding is also good as she listens carefully at instructions she is been told and she follows the rules because she knows their could be consequences. Alanya’s intellectual skills are brilliant because she uses all her senses and she explores things in great detail and she likes to learn new things.
Social and Emotional Development
Alanya likes to play with other children and knows how to share and take it in turns. She likes to play with her brother Cameran a lot and her cousins. She likes to play games like dressing up and dolls and house. She uses her imagination a lot of the things she does. She co operates well with people but can be a little bit aggressive at times when she doesn’t always get her own way. She is a pleasant child and likes to talk to everyone and likes to play with all different people. She also lets anyone join in the game even if they have started playing. She can be a little bit of a bossy boots at times, but someone always takes over the bossiness at times. She plays with other children that are her age so she tells them about school because her and Cameran go a different school to their cousins. So they tell one another little stories about what has gone on in school.
Alanya has a positive self-esteem her confidence is growing all the time, she can be shy in front of strangers and if she does something silly she will do shy but other than that she is confident in herself and her ability of what she can do.
She looks after herself a lot, she likes to keep brushing her hair and she loves cleaning her teeth, she thinks you have to clean them before you have something to eat and after you have something to eat. She cleans her teeth about 10 times a day.
Her confidence is growing all the time because she is encouraged to do new skills, praised for what she can do and not criticised for what she cant do, she is given choices about what clothes she should wear and which toys she is allowed out to play with.
Alanya is a child who isn’t spoilt but likes to play with lots of new toys and she knows she can get her own way a lot of the time. She doesn’t always get what she wants though. She is a child that loves everyone and likes giving cuddles and kisses to everyone. She is a mummy’s girl rather than a daddy’s because she likes to dress like her mum and act likes her mum etc. She is beginning to grow out of her shyness but I think she will always have a shy side to her when meeting new people.
Overall I think Alanya is a child that has confidence and is clever and outgoing child and has lots of ability and confidence in herself even though she can be shy at times. She has good basic skills and her language skills are brilliant as well. My FAR proved to be correct that Alanya would benefit from her physical skills and she prefers to do indoor activities but she is good at outdoor activities.
Alanya is a pleasant child that enjoys playing with people and being with people. Alanya and Cameran are treated the same really, but because Cameran is with his mum most of the time whilst his dad is at work then he does things like going shopping with mum on a weekend etc. which he thinks is for girls, when his dad comes home he just wants to play football or watch football on the television or do something sporty and boyish than play with dolls or do fine manipulative things such as drawing, colouring, playing with lego etc.
Alanya’s imagination is good, and a lot better than Cameran is this probably due to the fact Alanya will sit down and watch television for hours and hours but cameran won’t watch television for so long he always wants to be active and doing something different every 15 minutes.
With Cameran been a boy and Alanya been a girl I feel there is a difference in the way they are treated sometimes, and how they react to it, as they both think pink is for girls and blue is for boys, which most children think when they are that age but I also think that Julie and Chris have been involved for the children to believe that true fact because when they see other children like new born babies for example if it’s a girl it has something pink, and if it’s a boy it has something blue. This is sexual stereotyping with boys having blue and girls having pink.
During our visit to the local park I discovered several things about Alanya, whilst she was playing I noticed how she has gained more confidence in her own ability to try different things such as the climbing frame. The prediction I made about her physical skills was wrong and she proved much more able than I expected her to be .She showed a wide range of gross motor skills, which is rather unusual for her as she normally prefers to play indoors using her fine manipulative and intellectual skills As you can see from the interview with her parents in visit 2, she does go to them to be as good as they were.
Bibliography.
To find out my research I used the following resources:
Books
Childcare and development by Pamela Minett
Websites
Early Learning centre
Baby world
BBC
Rospa
mother care
toys r us
tomy toys
Lego
toys and play
I used Encarta 2000 as a software product
Letters
Toy ‘r’ us
Early learning centre
Pann
Lego
Mother care
National action plan
Mother and babies
When they finished there pictures of one another they showed them to one another and agreed they looked like each other. So their mum and dad could see them when they got home they put them on the kitchen table and wrote a note, guess whose whom! But I told them how to spell whose but they knew how to spell guess and who without my help. There stage of drawing was at a stage nine according to the childcare and development third edition by Pamela Minett.
Evaluation of the visit
As I said in my predictions I thought that Annie would have the more creative side to her, but I wasn’t that right as they both seem to have the same colouring techniques but different drawing. Annie said that she enjoyed drawing one better than the masks, but she found the mask activity easier. This shows that she likes to work herself hard and that she would rather do hard things than easy things. She sort off sets herself a target that she can do it even though it is going to be hard.
She likes to do creative activities a lot and she has got lots of colouring books and pens and pencils and crayons and sticky art stuff and all that stuff. She is always drawing pictures for her family; she even drew her own Christmas card for her mum and dad, and then a separate one for Cameran. I would say that Alanya is a more creative girl than a more physical activity girl.
I would say that Cameran has the ability to draw just like Alanya likes to do, but he is more bothered about playing football, playing with his toys, and acting like Spiderman. Alanya like to have her work showed off when she does something she likes it too get hung up on the wall in their activity lounge, and she likes the attention off doing something like that, where as Cameran if he draws a picture usually he just throws it in the bin afterwards instead of giving it to his mum or dad to put up on the wall. Alanya seems to be more creative and Cameran more physical this is probably because Cameran likes to get dirty etc and play outside where, as Alanya doesn’t really like to be outside doing dirty activities. Cameran is just as clever as Alanya is but doesn’t show it like Alanya does, he is lazy with things he does and says sometimes. Cameran could probably be even better than Alanya at drawing but won’t sit down and draw like Alanya does.
Cameran is going to have swimming lessons as well as Alanya, because it will boost there confidence when in water and it will be an advantage to them when they are older and go abroad and want to go into water parks etc. But because Cameran goes to football practice at the same time of the swimming lessons, Cameran has to go in the earlier group because off the time difference also because Cameran isn’t that strong a swimmer and isn’t too confident about the water and going in the pool etc.
Development. I observed her emotional development and positive emotions she gave when playing with the Lego. I noticed her language skills where rather good and her number skills were excellent. She is becoming increasingly skilful with her fine motor skills since she enjoys playing with small objects and construction toys. Her intellectual skills are brilliant because her imagination and her creativity are amazing. As she always seems to have something on her mind and knows what to do with the objects when they are given to her.
Alanya played with the Lego for about half an hour, which is pretty good for a child to stick to playing with a toy for so long, but she must of enjoyed it to play with it. She was concentrating hard when playing with the Barbie’s but lacked concentration when playing with the Lego she was just messing about at times and been silly, trying to get attention. She uses her imagination a lot in whatever type of play she is doing whether its creative, physical, fine manipulative etc, she always has a sense of imagination. Cameran has a sense of imagination but his imagination seems to be the same all the time because he just thinks he is Spiderman and when he goes to Florida Spiderman is going to pick him to be his helper and then he can’t come home again. He told his mum all this and he tries to copy things that Spiderman does e.g. climbing up walls etc.
Alanya gets her imagination of things she has seen such as television programmes, magazines, colouring books, films etc.