Most preschool-aged children begin to be curious that they like to explore things around them. And it is only one of the typical milestones in child development. How then to take care of their progress and needs during this period? One answer is to engage them in meaningful activities in a preschool program.
Child development involves fine and gross motor, cognitive, social, and emotional aspects. It is ideal for promoting all these factors for a child’s well-being.
Fine and gross motor development – Being mobile generally benefits one’s health. Physical activities help young kids develop their motor skills, so they can eventually do more things independently. Note that it takes practice also to have body coordination to carry out complete actions like running or dancing.
Fine motor development is about the progress of using small and a few muscles like hands and eyes only. An example of this is holding a pencil or crayon. On the other hand, gross motor development involves the use of big muscles and more body parts, like crawling and climbing.
Cognitive development – The way kids think and understand also has gradual growth. Their mental progress also concerns their abilities to memorize, communicate, and pay attention abilities.
However, compared to older kids, three to five-year-old learners have no or little ideas about the many things around them. It is why lectures and reading books alone cannot be enough. They need to use more senses to grasp concepts than sitting and listening. And the practical approach to that is to engage them with different learning modalities.
Activities in a well-designed preschool program are a valuable help. Kids have hands-on learning experiences in writing, drawing, playing, building blocks, and more.
Emotional development – Emotion plays a big part in the action, decision, and interaction with others. In the case of young kids, they don’t yet know as many emotions. Thus, they also can’t easily express, process, and manage their feelings. Activities in preschool can also help them learn, experience, and stimulate emotional development. It can be through group projects where kids learn to be patient, cooperative, kind, etc.
Fostering good emotional development is a long process. It even involves cognitive, motor skills, and especially social skills before kids manifest emotional growth. But it is worth it because these lead them to adopt good values and traits. It includes being confident, calm, coachable, or engaging.
Some emotional development-related activities are playing and group projects, which may lead to camaraderie, building rapport, and enthusiasm to learn more. Another meaningful task in preschool is following a routine. It teaches kids concepts like self-discipline, accountability, respect, etc.
Social development is linked to how a child interacts or communicates, forms connections, and works with others. Adopting social skills is beneficial because it affects other areas in child development, mainly emotional development. Socializing also boosts self-confidence, humility, empathy, and other good traits.
Promoting social development is essential for kids, so it becomes comfortable for them to engage in teamwork, sports, or other interactions. And the good thing about preschool, developing social skills is always feasible with various activities and events. Every day, kids can socialize, play, and be with their class.
Recent Comments