Early childhood is a time that is marked by great changes. A short and chubby infant suddenly becomes leaner and taller, a shy kid gradually becomes more outgoing, or a child known to eat less starts having a large appetite.
Apart from the obvious changes that are noticed, the more integrated development is what we will be looking at in this article: the biological, psychological, and social changes that are occurring as a result of motor skills development.
Motor Skills Changes and Growth
PARENTS.COM describes Motor Skills (Gross or Fine motor skills) as responsible for all the physical changes observed in a child. From running to jumping, hopping to turning, dancing to body balancing, all these body movements are a result of Gross motor skills.
Fine motor skills, on the other hand, are responsible for smaller body movements like drawing a diagram, writing letters of the alphabets and performing simple tasks like buttoning a shirt or tying of shoelaces. One truth is that both the Gross motor skill and Fine motor skills are refined during these formative years. Read more here.
Try to compare how a 4-year old will button up his shirt and how a 7-year old will button that same shirt for example. You will believe that the rate at which they complete the same task will be different. And it will even get better if a 15-year old is doing the same task. So, with age comes a perfection of these motor skills.
Understanding this fact will not make parents too anxious when their kids take a while to learn some skills. The advice is: be patient, it takes time. It is to be noted that some skills can only be learned as a child. For instance, it may take an adult a long time to learn a new language, while it will take a child a lesser duration of time to learn the same language.
Health Changes
Kids are known to be healthy but are prone to illnesses. In one publication, it is mentioned that kids are prone to coughs, colds, and other stomach related discomforts. This is because their internal organs and systems are not yet fully developed. Since most illnesses a child may have does not necessarily require seeing a physician, this will teach these kids’ skills that will help them cope with other physical discomforts in the future. It will also help them understand what others may be feeling when they are ill as it will be called to mind by the motor skills. Read more here.
Brain Development
Since the nervous system controls the brain, any perceived change in how the brain behaves is a function of motor skills. Now here’s something you will be particularly interested in: the more complex the changes experienced by the nervous systems and brain, the more complex cognitive and behavioral abilities such children will be capable of.
One other function of the brain formation handedness, which determines whether a child prefers using the right hand or left hand. This too is the functions of the motor neurons. Read more here.