Developmental Milestones

Summary
Educ 84
Jamie VanHuizen
December 4th, 2015
 Birth to 6 Months Old
Opening Statement:
In the first 6 months of life babies develop so much. Within the first 6 months
babies begin to recognize their mothers voices, they learn how to roll onto their
tummies, they gain motor skills such as: grasping objects, reaching for objects, and
holding things in their hands. At four months of age a baby is also able to hold its
weight and take steps with help. In the first 6 months of life babies learn how to do
so many amazing things. They develop social skills, communication skills, physical
skills, cognitive skills, and emotional skills.

Physical:
Page 24. Domain: Physical (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 5.1 Gross Motor:
Reaching and Holding- Reaching towards objects
In the first 6 months babies are able to reach for, and hold objects for a short
period of time. This typically beings to occur when the baby is 2 months old. A baby
will make it clear that they want an object by reaching out their hands for it.
However, at 3 months old a baby is able to hold objects for longer and can stretch
their arms and legs our farther, and for longer. (Healthy Families BC. 2013. Para. 2)
An example of when a baby would show displays of reaching is when they are
sitting in their jumper and they either want out of the jumper, or they want a toy or
something that is on the floor somewhere else.
Page 25. Domain: Physical (Infants- birth to 24 months): Skill 5.1 Gross Motor:
Strength- Increasing strength in gross motor skills
Throughout the first 6 months, babies gain a lot of strength in their bodies
which is crucial to development. At one month old babies are able to hold their
chins up, and at 2 months they can hold their chests up. Then, at 4 months old they
are able to sit with support, and at 5 months they can sit properly on a persons lap,
and then at 6 months the baby is able to sit in a highchair. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg.
127. Figure 5-4)

Emotional
Page. 19. Domain: Emotional (Infants- birth to 24 months): Skill 2.1 Expression of
Emotion: Expressing anger, anxiety, fear, sadness, joy, excitement
Babies being to express emotions the day that they are born. Babies show
signs of happiness in as little as the first few weeks after birth by smiling. And then
around 4 months smiling is joined by laughter. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 180).
Newborns show signs of distress as well, but it is harder to distinguish
negative emotions when they are still so young. In the first 6 months babies
are becoming more social, so as signs of happiness they smile and make
happy sounds as their own way of expressing emotions. Also babies express
negative emotions by crying and being fussy.

Communication (Language and Literacy)

Page. 21. Domain: Communication (Infants- birth to 24 months): Skill 3.3
Expressive Language Skills- Vocalizing and Babbling: Babbling using a wide variety
of sounds
Babies begin the first steps to speaking at around 2 months. They begin to
make sounds that are language based. They make sounds like ooooo and
aahhhhh that are referred to as cooing. At around 5-6 months they go from cooing
to babbling which involves sounds like bah and dah (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg.
168)

Cognitive
Page 22. Domain: Cognitive (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 4.1 Attention
Regulation: Shifting attention with increasing ability
When a child is in between birth and 6 months old they are learning many
things. A cognitive skill that they are developing is attention regulation. They are
becoming more able to shift attention between things such as the toy they are
playing with, and their parents.

Social
Page 18. Domain: Social (Infants) Skill 1.2 Imitation: Imitating adult behaviour
It is said that newborns are able to imitate adult behaviour. Although some
people do not believe that this is true, Melzoff and Moore (1989, 1994) claimed that
2-3 week olds would stick out their tongues or open and close their mouths to
match an adults acts. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 162) Babies may do things such as
smile when an adult is smiling, or be distressed when an adult is distressed. This is
a sign of imitating adult behaviour.
Closing Statement:
An example of a small interaction that you could do with an infant between
the age of birth and 6 months that you could do to help increase the babies
reaching and holding abilities (physical development) is hold an object or toy that
they really like in front of them so that they must extend their arms out to try and
grab it. Also, an example of a small interaction to display cognition (attention
regulation) could be to stand in front of a baby and talk to him/her a little and play
with them, then move across the room to another spot and see if the baby can shift
their attention to the different spot in the room.
 6 18 Months
Opening statement:
In the 6 to 18 month age group they learn amazing things and grow
tremendously. They go from babbling to making more clear words, and from
crawling/rolling over to taking their first real steps. Many things happen throughout
the age of 6-18 months. Some things that babies develop between those months
are their ability to sit-up and crawl, the ability to imitate games like peek-a-boo,
they sleep for longer, they imitate new sounds, and they become more competent
and can figure out solutions to many of their own problems. (Ages and Stages.
2015)

Social
Page 18. Domain: Social (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 1.2 Imitation: Take part
in pretend play with simple scenarios like caring for dolls
Children at this age often take part in pretend play games like imitation. An
example of this would be opening your mouth and having a child imitate you and
when they imitate you, telling them good job. Children at this age may also take
part in imitation when learning new words, like mom and dad. Another example
of this might be if I child has a stuffed animal and they pretend that it is real and
feed it, and play with it; they are taking part in pretend play.

Emotional
Page 19. Domain Emotional (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 2.4: Empathy-
Noticing and responding to distress of others
Infants get better at regulating emotions and showing more emotions as they
get older. By 6 or 7 months the baby begins to extinguish more clear emotions. A
6-month old can for example distinguish a happy, smiling face from a sad, frowning
face (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 182). If a mother is distressed, the infant will
understand this become distressed themselves, but if the mother is happy and
smiling, the child will be happy and smiling as well.

Communication
Page 21. Domain: Communication (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 3.3: Words with
Gestures- beginning to speak with more words than gestures
At 6 months old babies start babbling and making sounds like bah and
dah and then at 9 months old babies are able to understand basic words like no
and bye-bye. Most babies say a few simple words like "mama" and "dadda" by the
end of 12 months. (Your Babies First Words. 2014). Once a baby is able to speak
more basic words they are able to speak with more words than gestures. For
example, it a baby is sitting in a high-chair eating dinner and wants more of one
thing, they can say a basic word like ta or more to indicate that they want more
food rather than gesturing using their hands and pointing at what they want.

Cognitive
Page 23. Domain: Cognitive (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill: 4.6: Object
Permanence- Searching for things that move out of sight
For object permanence in children between the ages of 6 months to 18
months we can use Piagets theory to help explain it. Piagets theory of
sensorimotor thought says that by 8 months of age a childs understanding of
object permanence is incomplete, however at about 12 months of age, instead of
just accepting that an object has disappeared, the child will look for the missing
object in different spots. However, an infants full understanding of object
permanence is not complete until 18 months of age. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 155.)
For example, if you sit with a child and hid a toy that they are playing with
underneath a blanket, they will move the blanket and get the toy because they
know it is under the blanket, so they search for it.

Physical
Page 25. Domain: Physical (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 5.1: Gross Motor-
Walking
Most infants between 6 months and 18 months are typically learning how to
walk, in the process of walking, or can walk well on their own. By 10 months they
are able to crawl/creep, then by 12 months they are able to pull themselves up to
stand, and then by 14 months they are able to stand alone. By 15 months old most
infants are able to walk on their own. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Figure 5-4). If a child is
not on their way to learning to walk at 15 months it may be because they have not
had enough encouragement or opportunity.
Page 28. Domain: Physical (Infants- birth to 24 months) Skill 5.3: Taste Exploration-
Trying new foods
Nutrition is an important part of physical growth for children, and it is
especially important during infancy. Because growth requires so much energy,
young babies must consume an enormous amount of calories in relation to their
body weight (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 113) Introduction to new food is also good for
babies, but it is important to only introduce one new food at a time. For example, if
you give a 7 month old baby a piece of cheese to try, the child should not have any
other new foods for a few days. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 113)
Closing Statement:
 An example of a small interaction that could be done with a child to help their
communication skills could be if a child was sitting in a jumper and wanted a toy, if
the mother says you want the ball? the child responds with a gesture, then the
mother says ball and tries getting the child to respond. This is helping the child
with gestures but is also trying to get the child to speak basic words. An interaction
that could be done with a child to help with walking (physical) could be sitting with
both parents on the floor, each parents on opposite ends of the room, and have the
child practice walking back and forth to both parents. That would be a fun, and
helpful experience for the child. Children develop so much between the age of 6
months and 18 months. They learn to walk, they can speak more clearly, they gain
cognitive skills, and they become more social.

18 Months 2 Years 6 Months

Opening statement:
Children in between the 18 month and 2 and a half year old age group are no
longer known as infants, they become toddlers. As a child grows older they become
more intelligent and understanding of the world around them. They are very busy
and adventurous as they are now able to walk on their own without the help or
support of an adult. Their eating habits change, their sleeping patterns change, and
though they are still dependent on their parents they become more independent
and able to do more things without an adults assistance or support.

Social
Page 29. Domain: Social (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill: 1.1- Social Interest-
Engaging in short group activities
By age 2 and a half some children have been to day care, or are starting into
pre-school. By a child going to day care or pre-school they are engaging in group
activities. They are engaging in group activities by being surrounded by other
children, or by participating in activities at play time. Between the ages of 18
months and 2 and a half years a child is becoming much more social because they
are improving their speech skills, and they have more opportunities to be social and
engage in group activities.

Emotional
Page 31. Domain: Emotional (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill: 2.6- Identity
Formation- Identifying self and in relation to others
Self-awareness usually beings in children between the age of 15 months and
24 months. A good way to test a childs self-recognition is to put a red dot on the
end of the childs nose, and put them in front of a mirror. By 15 months the baby
can notice the red mark on their nose and will reach up and touch their nose,
realizing that it is them in the mirror. By the age of 2 virtually all children are
capable of doing this. Between 18 and 24 months toddlers look at more
photographs of themselves than at photos of other children. Toddlers tend to refer
to themselves by name or with a personal pronoun, such as I or me and
sometimes they know their name and gender. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 199)

Communication
Page 32. Domain: Communication (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 3.2:
Expressive Language- vocabulary- increasing vocabulary
Once a child is at 18 months old they start experiencing naming explosions,
which is a period of language learning when children rapidly learn new words.
Children at 18 months learn 10 or more new words a week. They are able to clearly
speak words like mom and dad and other simple words.

Page 32. Domain: Communication (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 3.2:

Expressive language- sentences- using simple sentences
Many 18-month-old toddlers can also link two words together to form
rudimentary sentences sentences without linking verbs or other connecting
words. She may say "All gone," "Want ball," or "Me up." (Sullivan, 2015) This occurs
around the same time as naming explosion.

Cognition
Page 33. Domain: Cognition (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 4.1: Attention
regulation- maintaining attention for increasing periods of time
Children begin to focus and attend for longer periods of time, in particular
while engaged in self-created and goal-directed play. Children also have an
increased internal capacity to organize and plan while attending and focusing.
Indicators for children include:

Works to find solutions to simple problems and/or obstacles, e.g., attempts to

climb onto a piece of furniture in order to retrieve a toy
Works on solving increasingly difficult activities, e.g., attempts to solve a
simple, three-piece puzzle
Remains focused for longer periods of time while engaged in self-initiated
play
Attends and stays engaged to often reach a goal, e.g., places all the shapes
in the shape sorter

(Illinois Early Learning Guidelines. 2008).

Physical
Page 35. Domain: Physical (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 5.1: Gross Motor-
Walking and running- stopping while running improves
 Once a child is able to completely walk on their own, the process of learning
to run begins. Running poses a challenge for children because running involves
moving the legs alternatively, however the child becomes airborne for a few
seconds so they need to learn to be able to maintain balance as they land. An
example of an activity that can be done with children to try and help teach them to
run, is by playing stop-start games like follow the leader, tag, or even a simple
version of Simon says.
Conclusion:
A small interaction that I would do with a child as an early childhood
educator, to help a child better their speech (communication skills), is to help them
conduct telegraphic speech, which involves using two-word phrases. So if I child
says juice implying that they want more juice, the adult can try to have the child
use a two-word sentence like more juice. Also, a really good interaction to do with
a child between 18-20 months or so to help them with cognition, (self-recognition) is
the example that I used above that involved putting a red dot on a childs nose and
putting them in front of a mirror. This is a really good idea to do with a child because
it helps them to become self-aware and shows them, when they are old enough to
understand, that they are simply looking at themselves in the mirror.

2 years and 6 months3 years and 6 months

Opening statement:
By age 3 on my virtual child simulation, my child Paige, was in preschool.
While Paige was in preschool I found out that her gross motor skills were above
average, for example, climbing, riding on trikes, kicking balls and playing catch, she
was in the average range in terms of understanding quantitative relationships, and
she performed about average in copying designs, solving picture puzzles, and
building block towers to match one made by the examiner.

Social
Page 37. Domain: Social (Preschool Kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 1.1: Making
friends- playing with other cooperatively.
When a child is old enough to attend preschool or daycare they are going to
be in areas surrounded with other children, so it is important that a child is able to
cooperate well with others, play nicely, and tries to seek out others to play with. At
age 3 when my virtual child was in preschool she had several little friends in the
preschool and was somewhat of a group leader in free play activities, such as
imaginary play or riding trikes. (Virtual child, 2014.)

Physical
Page 36. Domain: Physical (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 5.2: Fine motor-
Making a mark- scribbling expands to include lines and shapes
At age 2 children can scribble about 20 different scribbles including: vertical,
horizontal, zigzag, and circular lines. Then by the age of 3 most children are in
shape stage which means that children are able to draw six basic shapes: circles,
rectangles, triangles, crosses, Xs and odd shaped forms. (Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg.
218)

(Kail & Zolner, 2014. Pg. 218)

Emotional
Page 40. Domain (Preschool kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 2.4: Recognizing and
expressing emotions- identifying their emotions
Once a child is old enough, they are able to better understand and express
their emotions. For example, an 18 month old might be crying in distress and not be
able to explain what the problem is, where as a 2 and a half, or 3 year old may be
crying and when an adult asks whats wrong the child will be more able to explain
what the problem is, like if the child is crying because they fell, they will cry and be
able to explain that they have hurt themselves and that they are in pain.

Communication
Page 32. Domain: Communication (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 3.2:
Expressive language- Conversation- observing and attempting to join conversations
At 2 and 3 years of age children are very busy and always on the move. In my
own personal experience when Im babysitting or caring for a child between 2 and 3
they always want to join in on the conversation even when they dont necessarily
understand what is being said. They try and chime in with words that they think are
a good contribution to the conversation. Also when a child is in preschool they are
being told to use their words when needed to speak with a learning professional or
peer.

Cognitive
Page 34. Domain: Cognitive (Toddlers- 14 months to 3 years) Skill 4.7: Symbolic
thought, representation, and root skills of literacy- Pretend play- acting out simple
themes in pretend play: cooking, caring for babies
When a child is in preschool they will likely have free-time to play with things
in the classroom. Some of these things may involve playing with stuffed animals
and pretending they are real, playing with cooking utensils in a pretend kitchen, or
playing with dolls pretending they are real babies. These are all good activities to
help cognitive development in children.
Conclusion:
In my opinion, the age between 2 and a half and 3 and a half are really
interesting years. When I become an early professional I am excited to work with
children at this age because they are full of curiosity and excitement. A group
activity that I would do with children at this age do help their communication
development is play a simple easy group game of telephone where a child comes
up with a 2 word sentence and they go around a circle to pass on the message
around to the end. And activity that I would do with children to work on their
walking and running skills would be a game of portable Simon-says. For this game
children would listen to an adult, which also involves cognitive skills, and they would
so small actions and movements. Some of the things the adult might say would be
Simon says: run on the spot or Simon says: jump up and down.

3 years and 6 months to 5 years

Opening statement:
Once a child is 4 years old they typically start attending kindergarten or some
type of school. This is an exciting yet frightening thing for both parents and the
child. By this age group children are for the most part potty trained, and they are
able to walk and talk so that adults and other children can understand them.
Children are in kindergarten and are being more socially involved with other
children which forces them to improve their social skills and their ability to get along
with other children.

Social
Page 37. Domain: social (Preschool kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 1.3: Peer
group entry skills- observing before entering play
In my virtual child simulation my child Paige was a little on the shy side so
she was sometimes nervous to join other children playing. The teacher noted that
Paige seemed to have made one or two friends and usually played cooperatively
with them. She observed that Paige was sometimes reluctant to join in new
activities with unfamiliar children. (My Virtual Child, 2014)
Emotional
Page 40. Domain: Emotional (Preschool kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 2.4:
Recognizing and expressing emotions- identifying their emotions
This is the age when many children begin articulating their feelings. For
instance, while children naturally feel empathy, a 5-year-old might see a friend in
distress and say, "I'm sorry you are sad." If they are upset about something, they
will declare what they are thinking, such as, "I'm mad at you, Mommy." (Lee, 2015)

Communication
Page 42. Domain: Communication (Preschool kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 3.4:
Conversing with peers and adults- engaging in increasingly longer interactions
When a child is put into preschool and kindergarten they are going to be in
situations where they are conversing with peers and adults for a longer time than
they used to. For example, when a child is in kindergarten they being the process of
school learning, so they are being spoken to by adults and after often asked to
respond. Also, when they are in kindergarten they have play time, so they are
interacting with peers likely more often than when they were not in school.

Cognition
Page 49. Domain: Cognitive (Preschool kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 4.12-
Counting- counting in meaningful ways in play and daily living
By age 4, children can count to "ten," recognize written numerals "0" to "9,"
and add and subtract using numbers up to "four." Four-year-olds know some
variations of a circle, square, triangle and rectangle. They know days of the week,
months, and the seasons, but still cannot tell time. (PBS Parents, 2015). Children
may use counting in their daily lives if for example, they are at home and their
mother asks them how many plates are on the dinner table and they count to
help figure it out.

Physical
Page 54. Domain: Physical (Preschool kindergarten- 2.5 to 6 years) Skill 5.3: Fine
motor skills- Dressing- dressing without assistance
By age 3 children are typically able to dress themselves. When I was a full-
time babysitter last year, I would have to get the 2 children I was looking after up in
the morning and get them ready for school. They were 4 and 5 years old. Every
night before bed they would pick out the clothes that they wanted to wear to school
the next day. In the morning when they woke up I would prepare the breakfast and
they would get dressed on their own. By this age they didnt need assistance to get
dressed.
Conclusion
When a child is between 2.5 years and 5 years they have developed so much.
They can walk, talk, they are potty trained, they are either in kindergarten or
preschool and they are becoming very social people. As an early childhood
educator, an activity that I would do to help children with their counting skills
(cognition) is setting out a bunch of buttons on a table, and asking them to group
the buttons into piles of 1, piles of 2, piles of 3 and so on, all the way up to 10.
Something that I would do as an educator to help a child who is nervous to enter
play, and observes a situation before entering with other children would be to go
over to the child and ask them what they think of the activity that they are
observing. I would then tell them about how fun it is and ask them if they would like
to go over and join. I think that this would help to support the child, while still
encouraging them to enter the activity with other children.

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Image retrieved from: intelligentnest.com