Why childhood development is important?

Different theorists have explored child development for decades. Research in longitudinal studies has shown the importance of early childhood development through emotional regulation, life skills, socialization, independence, a sense of agency, and industry as promotions for self-esteem. The ways children develop their emotional regulation and learn how to temper themselves is through a myriad of ways, including parenting and teacher redirection. An effective way of teaching the complexity of emotional range is by reading books about emotions as children connect to these characters quite nicely. Teaching children how to regulate their emotions while learning how to use their rationale will take them right into adulthood practicing that very skill. In this way, child development is extremely important because teaching an adult this skill can be harder! The life skills that are taught to children will also take them through adulthood, and included in these are learning how to take care of the body, dress, do chores, and understanding your place in your environment. It’s amazing how much young people can actually accomplish, and oftentimes it is assumed that they cannot do something because they are young. Still, by giving them more to do a little bit at a time (scaffolding), you’re literally developing these building blocks that they will take into adulthood. These skills are necessary for developing independence and feeling a sense of agency and wherewithal that is so important to develop in childhood as they’re still forming how they view the world and themselves.

The importance of other children

Socialization and learning how to work together and cooperatively are important to develop in childhood. Again, these skills can be easily corrected as they move through playtimes and school to figure out the nuances of verbal and nonverbal behaviors. Children who do not have adequate socialization development grow into adults who struggle socially through avoidance, anxiety, and conflict. Some researchers believe that up to 80% of brain development happens between birth and five, so giving children at that age and beyond a sense of agency by empowering them with an exploration of activities and ideas especially reading, will develop brains that think. Balancing exposure to technology and screen time is very important because child development is about naturally learning how to engage with the environment and become as many self-starters as possible. This gives a natural development of feeling good after a task has been completed and feeling confident that that task can be completed.

There are certainly plenty of children that have struggled through their childhood years where development was spotty and unstable for a variety of reasons, and these children still grow into functional adults. But having every opportunity to create engagement stability as children also create resilience and strength to resolve the challenges that will come up into adulthood.