Children for parents will always be in the first place. With the advent of a child’s life, his views, worldview, attitude, emotional background change. From this moment, life takes on a new meaning, all the actions of the parent revolve around only one baby. Together they overcome all the crises of growing up, starting from the first, one-year-old, and ending with adolescence and the crisis of coming of age. In this regard, not the last place is given to children's characteristics of psychological development in primary school age.
Psychological features in the development in this period consist in a number of specific points that affect the growing up of the child and the formation of his character. Behavior, manners, manifestation of reaction, actions - all this depends on how the child’s social adaptation goes. But what are the main concepts involved in the study of this issue? What aspects of the child’s thinking and upbringing provided by parents and teachers reflect the main psychological and pedagogical features in primary school age in children?
The crisis of seven years
In the life of every child, a moment comes when it comes time to graduate from a preschool educational institution. The kindergarten and teachers are being replaced by a school and teachers. The kid is met by new acquaintances, new communication, new emotions and impressions. It is at this age that a child undergoes the so-called seven-year crisis. At this time, in primary school age, the psychological characteristics of which sharply make themselves felt by a change in the behavior of the child:
- First, the child loses its immediacy. This is a fundamental feature in the psychological and pedagogical development of children of primary school age. If earlier the thinking of a crumb was not able to separate words from thoughts, and he behaved on the principle of “what I think, then I say”, then during this period everything changes dramatically. No wonder this stage is called a crisis: the baby undergoes certain changes in his mind, and this is reflected externally in his habits. He can begin to manner, grimace, clown, alter his voice, change his gait, try to joke and work on the reaction of his parents, classmates, and others. All these manifestations indicate the growing up of the baby and his transition to a new stage of development.
- Secondly, deliberately adult behavior begins to manifest itself. The child seeks to defend his own position. He shows denial if he doesn’t like something, tries to behave as if he has already grown to the point where you can take a little care. At the same time, there is an interest in one’s appearance, and one’s exactingness towards oneself is shown. The child tries on the elements of self-observation, self-punishment, self-regulation, self-control. He begins to get acquainted with adults anew, as if entering into a role interaction, subject to the conditions of the situation in which he is. He manages to distinguish between communication: the manner of conversation varies depending on whether he is talking with adults or peers, whether these people are familiar or unfamiliar. He begins to show interest in classmates, in the course of establishing relationships, attachment, sympathy, friendship appears.
- Thirdly, in children, the peculiarity of primary school age in the psychological and pedagogical aspect implies the emergence of the opportunity to improve the right moment to start the educational process. That is, seven years is the same age when a child is ready to learn, receive information, learn new things. And here the involvement of parents and teachers in the process already works, since in the future this determines the ability or inability of the baby to study well.
Ability or inability
The psychological and pedagogical features of primary school age in children are also manifested in their readiness to learn: the child is aware of the level of his abilities, he is able to make contact, obey what his elders say. In no age period is the ability to meet the requirements and prescriptions of teachers and parents the way it was at that time. A kind of complaisance is associated with the stage of growing up and changing the elements of the child’s thought process. Not surprisingly, first graders are always considered diligent students and obedient pupils in the classroom. From this moment, their full psychological development begins, because this is the first social status of each baby: first-grader, schoolboy. Depending on how attentive parents are to this stage of their child’s life, how much they are involved in the children's learning process, it will depend on whether the baby will be able or incapable in the future.
All children are born capable. There are no disabled children. They can become incapable only as a result of incorrect education. But there is a flip side to the coin: upbringing is not omnipotent, there are natural inclinations: for some, they are developed to a greater extent, for someone to a lesser extent. It is important parental participation and maintenance in the child of those initial inclinations that he shows best.
Educational activities
Another psychological and pedagogical feature of students of primary school age is the acceptance of studies for leading activities. The most important thing that a student is concerned about at this stage of development is the educational process. He learns new moments, learns new skills, acquires new skills, builds a trusting relationship with the teacher, seeing in him something very significant, something that helps him grow up and become smarter. For a child, a teacher is a socially significant authority. But if the teacher admits loyalty in the matter of discipline and rules, for a child these rules will immediately lose their relevance.
Communication with peers
Surprisingly, it is a fact: it has been proved by numerous studies that the child most effectively assimilates the material precisely in the circle of his peers, in the process of communicating with them. The coefficient of mastering the educational topic is higher during the group study of a phenomenon by the guys than one on one with the teacher. This is another psychological and pedagogical feature of primary school children.
It is important to note that in no case should you interfere with communication with classmates. Firstly, for a child this is already a serious step - to start communicating with other people, with guys whom he does not know. Secondly, due to the isolation in early childhood in adulthood, such individuals become unsociable, socially inactive, lonely, therefore the age in question is a good start for the establishment of the right and necessary communications.
9 family commandments
In addition to studying and peers, family coziness, comfort and the friendly atmosphere of the house play an important role. Parents must learn a few basic rules for the development of children, the observance of which will determine the further upbringing of the child. What are they?
- It is necessary to take the baby as he is.
- You can not give orders to the child out of a whim - all requests, instructions and instructions must be justified, justified.
- You must be able to keep a balance: non-interference in a child’s life is as fraught as excessive obsession and intrusiveness.
- It is worth paying attention to your behavior and closely monitoring it - the child will always look at his parents as an object to follow. You need to get rid of bad habits, stop swearing and remember the evenness of your tone (never raise your voice).
- You need to establish a trusting contact between yourself and your child. Your child should believe you, only then will you know about his little secrets and you can influence the worldview, behavior, decisions made.
- Avoid over-seducing children with gifts - the child should not be spoiled by excessive attention, manifested in the eternal indulgence of his whims, desires and as yet unreasonable needs for toys and sweets. Otherwise, you risk raising a selfish family.
- Make all decisions together - the child should see that he is contributing to family councils, that his voice also means something.
- Get used to sharing everything equally in the family. So you bring up in the child the awareness that you need to be able to share with your neighbor.
- Never, being offended, do not add to the habit an indifferent silence in response to the questions of the offending child. This method of moral pressure can adversely affect the behavior of the child in the future, he simply begins to communicate with you in the same spirit.
These simple life values ​​are directly and directly related to the personal development of children and the psychological characteristics of primary school age. Briefly in modern family psychology they are called the nine family commandments.
Safe environment for the child
The key to correct, ethically correct parenting and age development is to stay in a friendly atmosphere at home and at school. The child’s energy background deteriorates if frequent scandals occur in the house, constant screaming, swearing, swearing are heard. Much depends on the situation at school: if classmates dislike the child, treat him like an outcast, the desire to learn and develop disappears. It is the duty of the parents to create a safe environment for the child at home, and the responsibility of the teachers is to monitor the relationships of the children in lessons, breaks, observe their differences and immediately reconcile them in the event of conflicts. This is another important point that affects the development and age-related psychological characteristics of primary school age.
Physical development
An integral part of the educational process are physical education classes. And we are talking not only about the exercises performed in the lessons, but also about the activities that parents should carry out with the child at home. Teach your baby from morning exercises to childhood. This not only disciplines the crumbs, but also accustoms to regimen, provides an opportunity to understand and accept the need for sports from early childhood. The active physical part closely intertwines with the thinking of the child, with his awareness of the need to live in active movement.
Perception
In preschool age, a child's understanding of the world is notable for instability, disorganization, and blur. Therefore, further acquaintance with perception becomes an essential element of cognition in primary school age, the psychological peculiarity and characterization of which is reflected mainly in the responsibility for the further mental and behavioral model in children. That is, in other words, how the child perceives the received information depends on how he will interpret it later and how he will behave as a reaction to perception.
It is noteworthy that by the end of the first stage of school, the perception of children becomes more analytical: they begin to constantly analyze what they see, hear, differentiate different things (distinguish between “bad” or “good”, “can” or “not”) - the child accepts the knowledge of the world around him more organized character.
Attention
Attention as a pedagogical feature of primary school children should also be actively developed and strongly supported by parents. The kid must be involved, he must be interested. This moment - primary school - is incredibly important in the overall complex educational process. If you miss the attention of the child at the initial stage, then you can only complain about yourself, and not slander about the inability of the child. Due to age development and natural inclinations in primary school age, the attention of the baby undergoes several stages:
- At first it is not stable enough, limited in time.
- It rises somewhat, but still concentrates on some uninteresting actions that distract and interfere with the main business.
- Involuntary, transient attention is included.
- Arbitrary attention develops along with other functions and, above all, the motivation of learning.
Speech
The speech factor is another psychological feature of primary school age. A socially active position is that through speech, the child begins to communicate with people around him, he becomes part of a team, a group of people (classmates), turns into a social unit, a part of society. The manifestations of social adaptation also follow from this. How confidently a child feels among his peers is often manifested in the degree of his speech activity - conversational communication with other children.
This applies to internecine speech as a necessary aspect of the baby’s communication with the world around him. But there is also another side regarding the correctness of the child’s conversation, the correctness of the words spoken by him. Here, the coordinated work of teachers and parents should be such that the child, pronouncing words incorrectly or pronouncing incorrect phrases, is constantly subjected to correction by adults. Such help will allow the child to quickly get rid of defects of diction, misunderstanding of words and their misuse in everyday speech.
Thinking
Primary education takes as a basis for the development of the thought processes of novice schoolchildren. In the transition from emotional-figurative to expanded abstract-logical thinking, teachers are trying to teach the child to understand objects and phenomena at the level of cause and effect relationships. Moreover, depending on the mindset, children are initially subdivided by psychologists into theoretical schoolchildren (the so-called thinkers) - they mainly solve educational tasks, practical children based on visual material in their thoughts, and artist kids who have a bright creative thinking.