CHILD DEVELOPMENT

CDLT6211
MODULE INFORMATION

 Prescribed textbook

Hardman, J. 2016. Child and adolescent development: A South African Socio-Cultural perspective. 2nd ed.
Cape Town: Oxford University Press Southern Africa

 Additional resources

VCLearn
MODULE OUTCOMES

 MO1 Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of teaching and learning theories.

 MO2 Discuss relevant concepts, processes and issues in the development of learning in children.

 MO3 Evaluate developmental characteristics and theories of development from birth to adolescence.

 MO4 Apply different teaching and learning theories to specific contexts in the classroom.
 ASSESSMENT

ASSIGNMENT DUE DATE: TEST DATE:

ICE task 1 due
LEARNING UNIT 1: AN INTRODUCTION TO
DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
Hardman, J. 2016. Child and adolescent development: A South African Socio-Cultural
perspective. 2nd ed. Cape Town: Oxford University Press Southern Africa
Chapter 1
THEME 1: WHAT IS DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY?

Learning outcomes:
 LO1: Provide a concise explanation of the field of developmental psychology.
 LO2: Explain the roles of nature and nurture in child development.
 LO3: Give an example to demonstrate both continuity and discontinuity in child
development.
 LO4: Discuss the role of universality and socio-cultural context in development.
The field of Developmental Psychology:
 Focuses on understanding how a child grows into an adult

 Understanding what processes are involved in this transformation

 Uses scientific methods to investigate psychological, emotional and perceptual

changes that occur throughout a human lifespan

 Investigates whether development occur through the gradual accumulation of

knowledge or through stages

 Studies the extent to which development depends on experience and innate mental
structures
Central issues in Developmental Psychology:

1. Nature versus nurture

2. Continuity or discontinuity

3. Universality and socio-cultural context

 1.Nature versus nurture debate

Are people born with innate capacities? OR does the environment

determine who people will become?

Activity
Draw a line that is a continuum from nature to nurture. For each characteristic given, place it on
the continuum according to how much you believe it involves nature or nurture.

Nature
Nurture

Skin colour
Language spoken / accent
Intelligence
Temper/aggressive behaviour
Body size
Down’s syndrome
Alcoholism
Political opinions
 Today we do not see development as either nature or nurture

 Development is seen as an interplay between genetic factors and environmental

factors
2. Continuity or discontinuity in development

 To what extent is there developmental continuity between humans and animals?

• Do all animals have the same capacities and behaviours? Is there a difference in the
degree?

 Is individual development continuous, with small changes occurring over time, or is

development discontinuous, with abrupt major changes over a child’s lifespan?
These 2 questions gave rise to 2 theoretical positions:

I. Some propose that development is continuous and gradual – as time passes, a child
develops though the accumulation of changes

 constantly adding new lessons and skills on top of old lessons and skills as they get
older
 children grow at a steady, uniform speed.

Example, a child learns to crawl, and then to stand and then to walk. They are
gradually learning how to walk.

Example: physical development (height)

11. Stage theorists propose that development occurs through stages, and at each
stage a child negotiates major changes that alter him/ her fundamentally

 develop chunks of abilities and experience events at certain times in life

 growing in spurts at special times and then are not growing so fast for a while in
between the spurts
3. Universality and socio-cultural context

 The brain develops in a social context

 Both nature and nurture are responsible for development

 People develop their uniquely human ways of thinking by interacting within a socio-
cultural milieu
THEME 2: WHY STUDY CHILD DEVELOPMENT?

Learning outcomes:
 LO5: Explain the importance of having knowledge and understanding in the field
of child development.
 Why study how a child develops?
 Helps us to have appropriate expectations about children’s and
adolescent’s behaviour

 Helps us to provide appropriate learning experiences

 Helps us to understand adults

 Helps us to interact with and make decisions about their

environments and activities

 Helps us with self-understanding

THEME 3:INNATE CAPACITY VS TABULA RASA (EMPIRICISM VS
RATIONALISM)

Learning outcomes:
LO6: Discuss the history of ideas (innate capacity versus tabula rasa) that inform the
different developmental schools.
Rationalism
 Rene Descartes

 The body is a physical entity subject to the laws of mechanics

 The mind is non-physical and not subject to the laws of mechanics

 Knowledge is gained through reason and factual analysis

 Some knowledge is innate , known without deduction (instinct and intuition)

 Our senses cannot be trusted

 In order for something to be true, it must be logically true

 We can work things out in our head and know them

She is playing chess with Kate
Empiricism
 John Locke
 Knowledge comes from observing the outside world
 Knowledge gained through experience and observation
 Knowledge gained through the senses
 We have no knowledge other than what we have experienced
 What you know is what you see

 Turned into a method of inquiry that used careful observation and experiments to gather facts and
evidence:
• Hypothesis – data collecting- data analysis- interpretation of results – support or refute the hypothesis

kahoot
Group task
Think of a situation where you could use this technique in the classroom:
a) to improve your classroom management
b) in your teaching subject
c) to improve test scores in your subject
SUMMARY: History of developmental ideas

 Plato- knowledge not empirical, not available through the senses, not product
of learning, but is innate. Children did not need to be taught : needed
guidance
 Aristotle- newborn mind a blank slate – tabula rasa. Written on by environment
and experience.
 Plato and Aristotle basis of nature vs nurture debate
 Descartes – rationalist – knowledge gained by empirical methods. Rejection of
perception. Embraced deductive method.
 John Locke – empiricist. Knowledge through empirical senses and experience.
Basis of behaviourism. Knowledge through instruction and experience,
 Descartes and John Locke :Gave rise to behaviourism and cognitive psychology
THEME 4:RESEARCH METHODS IN DEVELOPMENTAL THEORY

Learning outcomes:
LO7: Describe the various types of research design used in the field of child
development.
Qualitative and quantitative paradigms

 Depending on the research question (what you want to know), you can collect
different types of information (data).

 Qualitative studies collect information that is non-numerical and descriptive

 Quantitative studies collect information that is numerical.

Examples
I want to conduct a study about the canteen facilities on campus. I would like to find out
:
• how many students use the canteen
• how many students feel that the food in the canteen is expensive

I want to conduct a study about the canteen facilities on campus. I would like to find
out:
• Whether students feel it is value for money, and why
• Whether students feel that the supplier should be replaced, and why
Group activity
groups of 5

Imagine that you are a teacher wanting to conduct a study in your classroom.

Identify a qualitative study you could conduct

Identify a quantitative study you could conduct on the same topic.

Naturalistic observation
 Researcher observes the behavior to be studied in a natural setting

 Data collection methods:

• Counts: how many times did the behavior occur during the observation?

• Researcher narrative: writes down a narrative account of the observed behavior

• Video and audio: make audio or video recordings of the behavior for later analysis

 Drawbacks of this method:

• Researcher has to be unobtrusive – subjects may react differently if they know they
are being observed

• Different researchers may describe the same behavior in different ways (subjective)

• Example:
A teacher is complaining about the behavior of a particular class. The principal
Paired activity
Think of other examples of naturalistic observation that could be done in a classroom
setting
Cross sectional and longitudinal designs

 Cross-sectional studies observe a sample (cross-section) of a population, at a

specific point in time

 Generalise findings to the rest of the population

Example
If I wanted to conduct a study about how first year students feel about starting tertiary
education, I could study one class of first years at VC.

Drawback:
 Generalising to the population based on a single period of time

Longitudinal designs

 Tracks the development of phenomena over time

 Types of longitudinal study:
• Trend study – how is the trend changing over time?
• Cohort study – changes in a particular cohort over time
Examples of longitudinal studies

1. The Department of Education introduces a new curriculum in Mathematics. They

test the mathematical skills of learners who are in grade 1. Each year the same
learners are tested to determine the changes in their mathematical skills.

2. VC would like to see how their student population has changed over time. They
look at the data from 5 years ago, then start collecting data over the next 5 years.

3. The Department of Education does a study on how teacher use of technology in the
classroom has changed over time.
Correlational design

 To investigate how 2 variables are related to each other

Example:

What is the relationship between height and weight?

If you find that the taller people are, the more they weigh, that is a positive correlation

But it does not mean that one causes the other

A negative relationship will be : as one variable increases, the other decreases

E.g. the more children you have, the less money you have
Experimental design

 Useful for establishing a causal relationship

 Manipulates one variable to determine the effect on the other variable

Independent variable –the one that the researcher believes will cause an effect
(manipulated / changed)

Dependent variable –the variable that changes depending on the impact of the
independent variable

Example
Does having more children affect how much money you have

What is the independent variable?

What is the dependent variable?

Group activity

Determine the dependent and independent variable in these studies:

1. Does tutoring affect test scores?

2. Does the amount of sleep you get affect your performance in class?

3. Does caffeine affect your appetite?

How do we make sure our research findings are scientific?
Research must meet the criteria of:
1. Objectivity
2. Reliability
3. Replicability

4. Objectivity – researcher’s own preconceptions should not distort results

5. Reliability – if the conditions are the same, the researcher should get the same
results each time they conduct the same test. Different researchers should also
get consistent results

6. Replicability – will another researcher come up with the same results?

Kahoot RESEARCH DESIGN