Due to my three sheets of area of developments I had chosen my development I was focussing upon. As I found out what development I was looking into I also had to choose what I was going to expect of Jack over the next six months. Due to this sheet this made me feel more organised to complete the rest of my coursework as I completed this with great detail, enough to make me feel much more comfortable towards completing my visits also the rest of my written work in the coursework. At this point I had also wrote what I felt I should be looking into in the next six months, that being his talking skills, reading skills, social skills, drawing skills, knowledge of colour and finally knowledge of size. This again obviously made me feel organised as when I got to planning my observations I referred back to this page to help me organise and enhance different activities about each task.
To help me organise further throughout my coursework I had completed a brain storm of possible sources of research from this I had found that asking midwives, doctors, health visitors, parents of my study child, nurse, nursery nurses or even searching the internet, flicking through child development text books, leaflets or even looking at Jacks red record book will give me a great amount of information to help me throughout my coursework and plan different activities.
In development I had researched eight possible skills I may observe and write an example activity for each skill. Each task referred back to intellectual development, which including drawing, writing, memory, social, knowledge of size, colour and nursery rhyme skills. “My chosen area of focus” page helped me to complete ideas of activities and the skills I will choose as I had wrote these down in a late stage of my task analysis. As I had wrote down and understood the activities that Jack should be able to do in intellectual development for a five year old this had also help me complete this page.
I looked at possible methods of observing and understanding Jacks intellectual developments. These methods helped me complete and prepare my planning my observations and my attitude towards the visits was calm as I was organised to know exactly what to do. The only weakness in this area was that a lot of my activities during the visits used the same methods, simply because of my chosen area being limited.
Finally in my development I had completed a table that explained the advantages and disadvantages upon how often and how long I should take at my visits with my study child. Doing this table helped me to choose the amount of time and how often I wanted to visit Jack. Overall I had chosen to go on a monthly basis, as doing this will help me recognise the progress easier which in my view was better and much easier for me to evaluate. The disadvantage for visiting monthly was because I and my study child would have less of a bond. But, I have known Jack since he was born and we already have a strong bond. His parents are very close with mine also. I had also chosen to go for 1-2 hours for each visit. This obviously gave me enough time to complete an observation with great detail. However the disadvantage upon this was that I had to make sure my activities would constantly amuse Jack or else he would get bored therefore maybe resulting with a tantrum, wanting to do something else maybe. I knew that I could handle this because Jack and I get on well and when a tantrum occurs I am able to handle it.
Planning for my observations consisted of having the date, place, approximate time, what I hope to observe, resources needed, how it would be recorded also the problems I might encounter and how they will be solved during my visits. This organised the whole of my visit, as it was a record of what I will be doing and when. I took this to each visit and a pen and paper to help me order my activities and record my observations. At first I organised to observe Jack’s speaking skills and what I wanted to observe was written at the top of my plan and was further explained underneath on how I will be carrying these activities in detail.
At the end of each plan I had completed a table of possible problems I might encounter during my visits. To answer to had written to the side how I would overcome these problems. Completing this helped me throughout observation six as Jack did have a slight tantrum. But in minutes he had calmed down.
Overall I believe that planning my observations helped a great deal as I felt more organised to visit Jack, my study child. Each plan helped me to complete activities during the visit with ease and on time to have it done in 1-2 hours.
Each of my observations was completed with ease, as during my visits I wrote down notes of Jack’s reactions and abilities therefore not forgetting them when completing my written work. I had also done my observation not long after the visit therefore they were completed with detail.
My observations were to prove Jacks work and explain in great detail how the visit went and how he coped with each activity i had set. Without my planning for each observation my visits would not end how I would of hoped. Overall, I believe that each of my observations were a success as each of the size was completed with detail and all had shown the true activities and events which happened during my visit.
They had helped me realise Jacks progression in intellectual development. Also to help me evaluate the whole of my written work i evaluated each of the six observations, completed in a table and brief information on what i thought overall on Jacks progression. This helped me progress my evaluation and easier for me to recognise the progression of Jack’s intellectual skills as I was able to briefly read each evaluation to help me remember how Jack had coped with each activity.
To conclude the differences of each of the skills the comparisons were blatant. Jack and Elly both being 5 years old, drew houses with extra objects, showing their individual drawing skills. They had both drawn a front door, chimney and windows. However, Jack drew curtains whereas Elly had drawn different shaped windows. Showing her knowledge on different shapes. Also Elly had drew a sun and fog around the house, whereas Jack didnt. Although Jack had not drawn these, he had added curtains to the windows and a winding path from the front door.
When both children wrote their names as an activity they both had used a capital “E” and “J” proving they had a good knowledge upon having capital letters at the start of a name. Both also knew how to spell their names correctly, however they weren’t written neatly, which is understandable as they are only five years of age. Also, Jack had difficulties in writing the letter “K” in his name. However he did the rest of the letters in his name with ease.
Elly and Jack’s knowledge of location differed. Jack has known his street name and his house number whereas Elly had only known Halesowen throughout the whole of her address. Jack had answered this question with confidence however Elly had struggled to answer. Also Jack had given me extra information, like the colour of his front door. Thus proving he had confidence in his answer.
Overall, although there was a small amount of months between the ages of Jack and Elly the developments were hard to encounter, as they were both better at other activities than another. E.g. Jack had answered where he lived in confidence whereas Elly had struggled. This basically depends upon the individual child. However if i was to compare Jack (a five year old) to a two year old the differences would be more easier to recognise also easier to evaluate.
