- by Diane Clark Johnson

Development is given in a range of years. Each child develops as an individual. Ask yourself, are you expecting too much or too little?

Your child's behavior "problem" may be just one of his/her important and normal developmental tasks. Awareness of these tasks should reassure you that your child’s development is normal and likely to change again soon. A behavior "problem" often lasts more than 6 months, happens in more than one place consistently, and appears as a pattern.

Normal Expectations:

During the past 15-20 years intrauterine development has become very important. Prior to this time, environmental effects on fetal development were not considered important.

Piaget’s Sensorimotor Period (Birth to 2 years)

0-1 years

• Trust of caregiver/parent
• Forming a secure attachment now is critical for later years
• World view is expanding

1-3 years

• Focus Oriented, can now experience outrage
• Self-control/self-management are key
• Impulses are out of control
• Parallel play normal
• Peers are competitors or providers
• Perspective taking is just beginning
• Able to learn cause and effect
• Thinking is relatively concrete

Piaget’s Preoperational Period (2-7 years)

2-5 years

• During the first five years of life, children are egocentric -- they can only see their own perspective
• Increasing ability to tolerate frustration and to delay gratification
• Important for them to say NO, allows them to have feeling of control
• Normal to have focused aggression
• Play is critical, imaginary friends are useful and normal
• External to internal control begins to develop/ more able to self-regulate
• Socialization learned; learning what is socially appropriate
• Language development
• Gender identity

5-7 years

• A very sensitive time for child when making mistakes
• Parent needs to allow mistakes and help teach that mistakes are opportunities to learn
• Parents can have influences setting cultural bias
• Parent can begin to plants seeds for empathy, through modeling

Piaget’s Period of Concrete Operations (7-11 years)

6-12 years

• Latency, this period sexual and aggressive drives diminish
• Generally a stable period
• Beginning of our continuous memory/Can begin to develop expectations
• Most memories are happy
• Adaptive functions solidified, habits and patterns develop now
• Child is often able to organize and get along on their own
• Social skills and ego functions develop now
• Peer relationships are key
• Develop "social markers" or labels i.e.: fat, left-handed
• Mastery is important, being good at something is critical
• Interest in the outside world

Important tasks during latency

• Friendships
• Self control (body, emotions)
• Mastery of environment
• Clear distinction between public and private life (secrets)
• External and internal life (fantasy)
• Reassuring during this period to know there is a "Higher Authority"
• Hobbies and organized collections offer opportunity for control, organization and order
• Personality traits develop now

8-9 years

• Competition enables self evaluation
• Peer rivalry
• Clear gender barriers in spite of efforts to avoid
• Able to be both caring and mean
• Teasing between sexes important -- helps set boundaries

Piaget’s Period of Formal Operations (12 and On)

12-18 years

• Social and moral development
• Rebellion, self identity or expression
• They want to be trusted

When considering your child’s behavior it is important to consider:

• normal developmental tasks, listed above
• external factors; family stress, parenting style, environment
• internal factors; temperament, biological vulnerability

If you suspect a behavior problem, it is important to get a thorough diagnosis. Only through a psychological evaluation can you rule out learning disabilities, ADD, ADHD, perceptual problems or genetic disorders.

Diane Clark Johnson is a Family Life Educator and director of A Family Resource in Oakland, California and co-author of Temperament Tools: Working with your Child’s Inborn Temperament Traits.