How Children Learn (Early Learning and Teaching): Indicators of Children's Development and Learning
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The curriculum is the sum total of possible experiences that could be provided to children in early childcare centers. Interactions with children must be appealing to compel children’s involvement and learning.
There is utmost primacy of how the curriculum or content is used with children in early learning settings. Experiences fostering development in all domains must be included in a day keeping in mind the interdependence of growth in different domains.
Curriculum in preschool encompasses the entire range of preschool experiences and opportunities for learning designed and planned for the total and integrated development of children.
Indicators of Children’S Development and Learning
Babies are born ready to learn and their brain develops by use. In fact, it is often said that of the brain, ‘use it or lose it’. We have to ensure that we are providing enough warm interactions of stoking children’s sensory capacities to reach their optimal competence. Developmental milestones describe emergence of new capacity or skill.
As they grow, they form different relations. No two children learn in the same way or at the same pace. Some children walk earlier while some may talk earlier. How we review that learning is occurring is by watching for changes also called as progress.
How Children Learn
Children learn in different ways. Some learn by seeing, some by hearing, some by listening, some by doing. Giving your child chances to play with other children is a great way to develop skills needed to get on with others. There is a possibility of tremendous social, emotional, physical and cognitive development, and it can come and go before you know it.
For children, early learning is best through play, stories, conversations, songs, rhythm, movement and opportunity to explore.
Children learn best by actively engaging with the environment. This may, in the early years include:
Development capacity | Learning |
observing things, watching faces responding to color, shape, voices listening to sounds and rhythm making sounds and singing exploring learning by experiencing experimenting by turning things around curiosity and interest asking questions like, “Why?’“ solving problems experimenting with textures or objects categorizing and listening, mimicking, repeating, practicing building skills moving to rhythm, repeating small stories memory, recall and sequence | responding to color, shape, voices making sounds and singing learning by experiencing curiosity and interest solving problems categorizing and building skills memory, recall and sequence |
Indicators of Progress
Regular observations, keeping daily records of individual child are some common methods. It is through such diary noting and records that parents are informed of their children’s unique features as well as how they compare with age related behavior referred as ‘age norms’.
Children gain cognitive progress when they are able to sit and listen to a story or engage in completing a puzzle. Social progress is defined when children are together and may play individually with blocks or share crayons while painting, wait for a turn on the swing etc.
Children also learn communication skills, enrich their expressive vocabulary and participate in art, music and dance. They also acquire early numeracy and literacy as they display interest in similar sounds, identifying sounds with other similar sounds and repetition of numbers.
Barrier-free and supportive interventions besides addressing ability, build empathy and awareness for co-existence. Development opportunities have to provide variations in activities as development is integrated and growth is holistic as well as dependent on domain interdependence.