A note of special thanks to Sherria and Kara

Sherria Green and Kara Cashwell,
I would like to take this time to thank you for your feedback and support during our time spent in the course Early Childhood Development. Your blogs and discussions each week have helped me to gain a deeper understanding of the materials we have studied throughout this course. Thank you for helping me to expand my knowledge and grow as a professional in the field. I know you will both go on to do great things.
Sincerely,
Lisa Brownell

Quote by Dr. Seuss

A person is a person no matter how small.

~Dr. Seuss

Dr. Seuss is someone who I have always believed to be a very wise and to speak the truth in such simplistic ways. In this quote I believe Dr. Seuss is pointing out that even at a very young age a person or child has feelings, ideas, and knowledge to share with the world around them. It is important for one to acknowledge this for children and to inspire them to expand upon there current feelings, ideas and knowledge.

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Holistic Development Assessment

Having been a part of assessing children for the past six years, whether it be through my undergraduate work or employment, I have found two main advantages. First, when looking at the holistic development of a child one can assess and see how the child is doing developmentally. Are there areas that a child needs to improve on? Is there an area that a child excels in? Assessing a child’s holistic development gives the teacher assistance with creating lesson plans. A teacher can individualize lesson plans for an individual child or for the whole class. Secondly, assessing a child’s holistic development at a young age can help one to find developmental delays or disabilities. When this is identified at a young age the child can begin receiving the necessary supports and services to possibly decrease the severity of the delay.

In Sweden when looking at a child’s holistic development and assessing it they look at language, literacy, numeracy, and personal and social development (David, 1998). They use the assessment for diagnostic purposes and to assess a school’s value (David, 1998). This assessment begins at the primary school age (David, 1998).  

In comparison American holistic assessment and Sweden holistic development have a few things in common. When looking at a child’s holistic development in America one is evaluating social, physical, cognitive, language, literacy, math, science, social studies, and the arts. The criteria for these areas are varied by age. Both American and Swedish assessment focus on language, literacy, social development, and mathematics. It appears based on my research that American assessment looks at all spectrums whereas Sweden development is more specific.

I believe that there are many different ways in which a child can be assessed for development, but it is more of a matter of what is done with that assessment. It is important to make sure the assessment is to benefit the child and not label the child. For example one might do an assessment and say a child is below average, average, or above average. By placing this label I do not believe there is an advantage. The data should be used to benefit a child’s learning experience as described above.

References

David, T. (1998). Researching Early Childhood Education: A European Perspective. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications Inc.