Child and

Adolescent
Development
Looking at Learners at Different
Life Stages

EDUC 50
 UNIT 1: BASIC CONCEPTS AND ISSUES ON
HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
Part I: Introduction

Module 2: The Stages of Development and Developmental Tasks

Importance of Development
1. Determine what to expect of children and at what approximate ages certain patterns of
behavior may appear or are expected to appear;
2. Plan for instruction which is based on certain developmental principles and to a great extent
determine what types of learning and amount of learning are appropriate for different age
groups;
3. Identify learners with developmental lags or delays so as to provide guidance and
interventions as early as possible.

Factors that Influence Development

 Socio-economic status of the family
 Nutrition
 State of health
 Physical defect
 Medico-dental care
 Sleep, rest and relaxation
 Play and exercise

Stages of Human Life and Their Characteristics

1. Prenatal period - is the period that occurs from conception to birth. This period is composed
of three sub-stages namely:
a. Period of the ovum or germinal stage is the first two weeks of life after
conception. The ovum is approximately pinhead in size and practically unchanged in size.
b. Period of the embryo or embryonic stage is the period from the second week to
the second month. All the essential features of the body, external and internal, are established in
this period.
c. Period of the fetus or fetal stage occurs from the end of the second month to
birth approximately 270 days after conception. Changes in actual size of the body are already
established during the preceding period.
2. Infancy is the first two weeks after birth.
 plateau stage.
 Major adjustment to temperature, breathing, nourishment (sucking & swallowing) and
elimination.
 helpless and immature.
3. Babyhood - End of infancy to 2 years old
rapid growth, decrease in helplessness and increase in independence.

4. Early childhood - 2 to 6 years old

 “pre-school age.”
 language is well established
 major development is the control of the environment characterized by curiosity,
 questioning, negativism and aggression.

5. Late childhood - 6 to 11 or 12 years old

“smart age” - child thinks he knows everything and does not hesitate to inform others

“gang age” - concern of the child is his gang and the desire to be accepted dominates his
behavior.

6. Puberty - overlaps the end of childhood and the early part of adolescence.
 rapid bodily changes lead to confusion
 feeling of insecurity
 changes are physical growth in height, the development of secondary sexual characteristics
in both sexes and menstruation in girls.

7. Early adolescence -13-14 to 17 years old

 becomes sexually mature changes occur in duties, responsibilities, privileges and
relationship with others
 characterized by instability, unhappiness, awkwardness of movement, strong emotions and
curiosity about sex.
8. Late adolescence -17 to 21 years old
 one must individualize, build up about his future, and begin to free himself from his parents.
 one reaches legal maturity & assumes status as adult.
 greater stability
 impulsiveness and emotionality gradually tone down
 body becomes proportional
 curiosity about sex is replaced by congenial heterosexual companionship.

9. Early adulthood - 21 to 40 years old

 ready to assume duties and responsibilities of adults
 behaviors conform to the approved pattern of adult in their culture
 career and family development starts during this stage
 characterized by adults’ three adjustments to: work, marriage, and parenthood.

10. Middle age - 40 to 60 years old

 marked by physical and mental changes such as cessation of reproductive capacities.
 peak period in life - financial, social success, authority and prestige
 career reaches its highest level
 change in interest although inflexibility dominates.
 period of self-assessment of past experiences
 retirement begins
 “Empty nest” crisis may be experienced.

11. Old age or senescence - 60 years to death

 time when individuals look back on life, lives on present accomplishments, and begins to
finish off his life course
 characterized by dependency and widowhood.
 there is a decline, regression, or a return to an earlier pattern of behavior and simple level of
function.
 there is gradual decline in physical and mental activity which one compensates for by using
past knowledge.
Developmental Stages/ Developmental Tasks by SANTROCK, J.W.
1. Pre-natal Period
“How from so simple a beginning do endless forms develop and grow and mature? What
was this organism, what is it now and what will it become? Birth’s fragile moment arrives, when
the newborn is on a threshold between two worlds.”
2. Infancy (from birth to 2 years old)
“As newborns, we were not empty-headed organisms. We cried, kicked, coughed, sucked,
saw, heard and tasted. We slept a lot and occasionally we smile, although the meaning of our
smiles was not entirely clear. We crawled and then we walked, a journey of a thousand miles
beginning with a single step. Sometimes we conformed, sometimes others conformed to us. Our
development was a continuous creation of complex forms, and our helpless kind demanded the
meeting eyes of love. We split the universe into two halves: ‘me and not me’. and we juggled the
need to curb our own will with becoming what we could will freely.”
3. Early Childhood (3 to 5 years old)
“In early childhood, our greatest untold poem was being only four years old. We skipped,
played and run all day long, never in our lives so busy, busy becoming something we had not
quite grasped yet. Who knew our thoughts, which worked up into small mythologies all our own.
Our thoughts and images and drawings took wings. The blossoms of our heart, no wind could
touch. Our small world widened as we discovered new refuges and new people. When we said
‘I’ we meant something totally unique, not to be confused with any other.”
4. Middle and Late Childhood (6 to 12 years old)
“In middle and late childhood, we were on a different plane, belonging to a generation and
a feeling properly our own. It is the wisdom of human development that at no other time we are
more ready to learn than at the end of early childhood’s period of expansive imagination. Our
thirst was to know and to understand. Our parents continued to cradle our lives but our growth
was also being shaped by successive choirs of friends. We did not think much about the future or
the past, but enjoyed the present.”
5. Adolescence (13 to 18 years old)
“In no order of things was adolescence, the simple time of life for us. We clothed ourselves
with rainbows and went ‘brave as the zodiac’, flashing from one end of the world to the other.
We tried on one face after another, searching for a face of our own. We wanted our parents to
understand us and hoped they would give up the privilege of understanding them. We wanted to
fly but found that first we had to learn to stand and walk and climb and dance. In our most
pimply and awkward moments we became acquainted with sex. We played furiously at adult
games but were confined to a society of our own peers. Our generation was the fragile cable by
which the best and worst of our parents’ generation was transmitted to the present. In the end,
there were two but lasting bequests our parents could leave us - one being roots, the other
wings.”
6. Early Adulthood (19 to 29 years old)
“Early adulthood is a time for work and a time for love, sometimes leaving little time for
anything else. For some of us, finding our place in adult society and committing to a more stable
life take longer than we imagine. We still ask ourselves who we are and wonder if it isn’t enough
just to be. Our dreams continue and our thoughts are bold but at some point we become more
pragmatic. Sex and love are powerful passions in our lives - at times angels of lights, at other
times of torments. And we possibly will never know the love of our parents until we become
parents ourselves.”
7. Middle Adulthood (30 to 60 years old)
“In middle adulthood what we have been forms what we will be. For some of us, middle
ages is such a foggy place, a time when we need to discover what we are running from and to
and why. We compare our life with what we vowed to make it. In middle age, more time
stretched before us and some evaluations have to be made, however reluctantly. As the
young/old polarity greets us with a special force, we need to join the daring youth with the
discipline of age in a way that does justice to both. As middle-aged adults we come to sense that
the generations of living things pass in a short while and like runners hand on the torch of life.”
8. Late Adulthood (61 years and above)
“The rhythm and meaning of human development eventually wend their way to late
adulthood, when each of us stands alone at the heart of the earth and ‘suddenly it is evening’.
We shed the leaves of youth and are stripped by the winds of time down to the truth. We learn
that life is lived forward but understood backward. We trace the connection between the end and
the beginning of life and try to figure out what this whole show is about before it is over.
Ultimately, we come to know that we are what survives of us.”
Developmental Stages/ Developmental Tasks by HAVIGHURST, R.J.
1. Infancy and Early Childhood (0-5)
 Learning to walk
 Learning to take solid foods
 Learning to talk
 Learning to control the elimination of body wastes
 Learning sex differences and sexual modesty
 Acquiring concepts and language to describe social and physical reality
 Readiness for reading
 Learning to distinguish right from wrong and developing a conscience

2. Middle Childhood (6-12)

 Learning physical skills necessary for ordinary games
 Building a wholesome attitude toward oneself
 Learning to get along with age-mates
 Learning an appropriate sex role
 Developing fundamental skills in reading, writing and calculating
 Developing concepts necessary for everyday living
 Developing conscience, morality and a scale of values
 Achieving personal independence
 Developing acceptable attitudes toward society

3. Adolescence (13-18)
 Achieving mature relations with both sexes
 Achieving a masculine or feminine social role
 Accepting one’s physique
 Achieving emotional independence of adults
 Preparing for marriage and family life
 Preparing for an economic career
 Acquiring values and an ethical system to guide behavior
 Desiring and achieving socially responsible behavior
4. Early Adulthood (19-29)
 Selecting a mate
 Learning to live with a partner
 Starting a family
 Rearing children
 Managing a home
 Starting an occupation
 Assuming civic responsibility

5. MIddle Adulthood (30-60)

 Helping teenage children to become happy and responsible adults
 Achieving adult social and civic responsibility
 Satisfactory career achievement
 Developing adult leisure time activities
 Relating to one’s spouse as a person
 Accepting the physiological changes of middle age
 Adjusting to aging parent

6. Later Maturity (61 and over)

 Adjusting to decreasing strength and health
 Adjusting to retirement and reduced income
 Adjusting to death of spouse
 Establishing relations with one’s own age group
 Meeting social and civic obligations
 Establishing satisfactory living quarters

Abstraction
Concept of Developmental Tasks
Robert Havighurst defines developmental task as one that “arises at a certain period in our
life, the successful achievement of which leads to happiness and success with later tasks while
failure leads to unhappiness, social disapproval and difficulty with later tasks.”

Developmental Stages
The 8 developmental stages cited by Santrock are the same with Havighurst’s 6
developmental stages only that Havighurst did not include prenatal period, but instead combined
infancy and early childhood while Santrock mentioned them in 2 separate stages.

The Developmental Tasks: Explained (Santrock, 2002)

1. Prenatal Period (from conception to birth) - It involves tremendous growth-
from a single cell to an organism complete with brain and behavioral capabilities.
2. Infancy (from birth to 18-24 months) - A time of extreme dependence on
adults. Many psychological activities are just beginning- language, symbolic thought,
sensorimotor coordination and social learning.
3. Early Childhood (end of infancy to 5-6 years [grade 1]) - These are the
preschool years. Young children learn to become more self-suffcient and to care for
themselves, develop school readiness skills and spend many hours in play with peers.
4. Middle and Late Childhood (6-11 years of age, the elementary school

years) - The fundamental skills of reading, writing and arithmetic are mastered. The child
is formally exposed to the larger world and its culture. Achievement becomes a more central
theme of the child’s world and self-control increases.
5. Adolescence (10-12 years of age ending up to 18-22 years of age) -
Begins with rapid physical changes- dramatic gains in height and weight, changes in body
contour and the development of sexual characteristics such as enlargement of the breasts,
development of pubic and facial hair, and deepening of the voice. Pursuit of independence
and identity are prominent. Thought is more logical, abstract and idealistic. More time is
spent outside of the family.
6. Early Adulthood (from late teens to early 20s lasting through the 30s)

- It is a time of establishing personal and economic independence, career development,

selecting a mate, learning to live with someone in an intimate way, starting a family and
rearing children.
7. Middle Adulthood (40 to 60 years of age) - It is a time of expanding personal
and social involvement and responsibility: of assisting the next generation in becoming
competent and mature individuals; and of reaching and maintaining satisfaction in a career.
8. Late Adulthood (60s and above) - It is a time for adjustments to decreasing
strength and health, life review, retirement and adjustment to new social roles.