Summarize Child Development Theories

The only time I heard about theories in school was when I was in science class. But when
trying to figure something out you have to have a theory and then you have to test that theory.
Well anything you do you have to do that so you know what works. There are so many people
that were great theorist and if early childhood education did not have those theorist who were
passionate about children, and what they should be gaining in life, I dont think early childhood
education would be where it is today, and where it can go. Things are always evolving but you
need those basic theories to help you reach where the potential can go, you need that
foundation. In the textbook Children it talked about how there is a wide range of theories
which makes an understanding of childrens development a challenging undertaking. Then
when you think one theory has the most helpful explanation of childrens development,
another theory crops up and makes you rethink your earlier conclusions. But I think theorys
like I said are foundations, there are a lot of theories but they all make you think and make your
conclusions. There are five major theoretical perspectives: psychoanalytic, cognitive,
behavioral, and social cognitive, ethological and ecological. Psychoanalytic theories describe
development as primary unconscious and heavily colored by emotion. Two Psychoanalytic
theorist are Sigmund Freud and Erik Erikson. Freud proposed that personality has three
structures: the id, the ego, and the superego. Eriksons theory has eight stages of development:
trust verses mistrust, initiative versus guilt, industry versus inferiority, intimacy versus isolation,
generativity versus stagnation, and integrity versus despair. Have we learned more about
psychoanalytic theories sure, but these theorist have the foundation set for us to learn more,
and discover more. Cognitive theories emphasizes conscious thoughts. There are three
cognitive theories are Piaget, Vygotskys sociocultural cognitive theory, and information-
processing theory. Piagets theory states that children actively construct their understanding of
the world and go through four stages of cognitive development. Vygotskys theory is a
sociocultural cognitive theory that emphasizes how culture and social interaction guide
cognitive development. Information-processing theory it emphasizes that individuals
manipulate information, monitor it, and strategize about it. Behavioral and social cognitive
theories, behaviorism essentially holds that we can study scientifically only what can be directly
observed and measured. There are three theorist Pavlovs classical conditioning, Skinners
operant conditioning and Banduras social cognitive theory. Pavlov discovered the principal of
classical conditioning, in which a neutral stimulus acquires the ability to produce a response
originally produced a response originally produced by another stimulus. Skinners operant
conditioning the consequences of a behavior produces changes in the probability of the
behaviors occurrence. Banduras social cognitive theory holds that behavior, environment, and
cognition are the key factors in development. Ethological theory stresses that behavior is
strongly influenced by biology, is tied to evolution and is characterized by critical or sensitive
periods. Konrad Lorenz helped bring ethology to prominence. Bronfenbrenners ecological
theory holds that development reflects the influence of several environmental systems, five
environmental systems are microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and
chronosyestem. All these theories have evolved from where they came from but they are the
foundation of what we know and where we grow from with child development. With knowing
these theories we can put them into our work with children. They can help create the
environment the children are in, experiences they will have in child care.