A Look at Your Children's Intellectual Development Stages
Children are very different from adults, and their years of schooling are designed to encourage them as they develop their intellectual abilities and make the transition from childhood to adulthood. The major stages of your child’s development are:
Sensory Motor Period
From birth through the first year of his or her life, your child begins to perceive and react to the world around them. They will grasp for objects, open and close their fingers, and kick their feet. Children learn to reach behind or around objects to reach a desired toy and begin to internalize their problem-solving abilities by thinking about simple sequences of actions before performing them.
Preoperational Period
From about 2-7 years of age, children first learn to use language referring only to the self before learning to ask about other people and subjects. By the time they begin school, children have learned to think about objects that are not directly present through the use of language and begin displaying simple logic. However, their reasoning is still very basic—they have trouble grasping moral concepts and function mostly by what they are told to do and not to do.
Period of Concrete Operations
From 7-12 years of age, your child begins to develop solid logical thought and is capable of classifying and ordering objects on a much higher level than before. Their thinking will continue to become less egocentric as they continue to grasp and understand the world around them and how they fit into it.
Period of Formal Operations
From age 12 onwards, a child’s ability to think abstractly and logically increases. They are able to formulate many possible plans of action and comprehend multiple outcomes as their thinking becomes less tied to their physical reality and they learn to internalize concepts such as possibility and probability.
The teachers at the Starwood Montessori school understand how to nurture your child through his developmental stages to instill a love of learning. Visit us online or call (972) 712-8080 today to find out more.
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