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The socio-cultural theory depicts the way how individual’s psychology is related to cultural, social, and historical factors.

According to Lev Vygotsky, the theory of social development argues that community and language play a central part in learning. The children develop independently of specific stages as a result of social interactions. Normally, children are born with four elementary mental functions such as, attention, sensation, perception, and memory. The social and cultural environment that allows to use these elementary skills to develop and finally gain higher mental functions. This progress ideally happens in the zone of proximal development, firstly the things that children can do on their own and secondly in the zone of proximal development child is capable in activities through scaffolding which means what children can do with the help of an adult, a friend or technology. And finally, there is the zone which is beyond the reach of the children’s capability (Kozulin, 2004).

The development of higher cognitive functions and only those of learning with the assistance of a capable mentor can reach the full potential of their ability. Therefore, inside the zone of proximal development learning can precede child’s psychological development. Which means that a child is able to learn skills that go beyond their natural maturity. Similarly, there is an explicit connection between speech and mental concepts arguing that inner speech develops from external speech by a gradual process of internalisation, this means the thought itself develops as a result of conversation.

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Vygotsky's Zones of Proximal Development

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Vygotsky's Zones of Proximal Development

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-          Teaching a child how to ride a bicycle (scaffolded by an adult)

-          Instructional games (help of technology)

-          Creating a craft as a group (peer interactions)

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Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy theories are mostly based on his experiences as a child who went through poverty and oppression in education during colonization in Brazil. His concept of “Banking knowledge” is a good example for his background which educators consider students as empty vessels that knowledge should be deposited in them.

According to Freire’s critical theories, education is shown as a democratic right where children have agency to choose what to study, able ask questions, make comments and expressing ideas. Critical theory is about collaborative and social nature of learning environment where children interact with teachers. And teacher’s duty is to support and guide when necessary and not interrupt the agency of children. Moreover, critical literacy is highlighted in the critical theory as children have a right to ask questions about what they see and hear, make different explanations and comments. Furthermore, Freire believes that active participation in the classroom, completing tasks with the given instructions, problem solving and decision making improves the child’s capability of critical thinking, independence, and resilience (Morrow, Torres , 2002).

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-          Using name of the child and teacher to communicate as a way of equity among educator and child

-          Letting the children to choose to work in a group or individually or which toy/book they want to have

-          Sharing knowledge activities for an example if they want to learn about space teach them things about space and let them express what they think.

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Piaget’s theory argues that there are four stages of cognitive development of human life. They are Sensorimotor stage, preoperational stage, concrete operational stage, and formal operational stage. Once a person goes through all these stages which is different from one another, he or she can reach to full human intelligence.
Early childhood education and supportive parenting can affect this cognitive development of the children. Furthermore, healthy environment, nutritions and maternal child interactions will influence in the development of the child (Nolan, Raban-Bisby, 2015).
There are different activities to stimulate development stage of children such as naming objects, sorting puzzles, telling jokes, reading books to the child and teaching songs etc.

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Amazing Fact about child's brain development

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Amazing Fact about child's brain development

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A toddler between the ages of 1 and 2 years, will gain 2 million new brain connections every second. At 2 years of age, a child has more than 100 trillion new brain connections, or synapses. However, when a child finally becomes an adult, more than 50% of these acquired synapses disappear.

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Theories in child development is important because it provides the fundamental understanding of human growth in different stages of life from birth. The motor skills, social, emotional, cognitive, and linguistic behaviours are mainly focused on developmental theories. And it helps the early childhood educators to decide their pedagogy and adapt their strategies in accordance with the early childhood setting. Among the child development theories, Developmental theory is outstanding as it addresses the child’s growth. Understanding developmental theory will be very useful for educators to deal with children of different ages and stages. Apart from Piaget’s theories, other theorists who contributed to developmental theory such as Erikson, Bandura, Steiner etc. explain the capabilities of children and how to develop and hone their potentials into practice(Robinson, Diaz , 2006).

As a future Early childhood educator, I personally prefer developmental theory since it covers a broad spectrum of the idea of child development in different perspectives. Moreover, developmental theories are practically applicable in different teaching settings and knowing that those activities develop particular aspects of children is more valuable as it brings a satisfaction to contribute to develop their future. Activities such as games to understand big and small objects, playing hide and seek, riddles and jokes, songs including actions such as “if you happy and you know it” etc. are some practical examples that can be used in the classroom.

The development stages of children are critically and directly matter to their overall development in their whole life span. Building self-confidence, independence, decision making, moral and ethical attributes and risk taking etc. are major factors that will thrive with the early childhood development. On the other hand, boosting memory, concentration and focus, evaluation and analysing skills, logical and critical thinking are focused on the developmental theory. In conclusion, the knowledge of child development theories is a must for the educators to provide a supportive and collaborative learning environment for the children.