Social Skills Behaviors:
In the first five years of their lives, children should be given many opportunities to practice and grow in their social skills. Specifically, you should look for growth in the following behaviors, though the children won’t reach their full social potential for many years beyond age five:
Cooperation
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Working together in our play and explorations
Assertion
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Clearly and verbally asking for what we need; standing up for ourselves and our work
Responsibility
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Cleans up materials when finished, both on our own and with our class at clean up time
Empathy
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Helps others if they need it; kindness towards our friends
Self-Control
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Appropriately expressing our wants, needs and emotions; recognizing when we need to express these
Looking for a tool to use to document your observations of preschool children’s learning and development? Take a look at the checklist that I use with my preservice teachers. After documenting the evidence they observe, I ask them to write a brief reflection of what they observed in relations to the child’s growth.
Child Development Checklist
Your Name: ____________________
Child’s Name: ____________________
Child’s EXACT age (Years and Months): ____________________
Child’s First/Home Language: ____________________
|
Check |
Item |
Evidence |
|
SELF IDENTITY AND SELF ESTEEM |
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| Separates from primary caregiver without difficulty | ||
| Develops a secure attachment with teacher | ||
| Completes a task successfully | ||
| Makes activity choices without teacher’s help | ||
| Works independently without requiring adult presence or direction | ||
| Stands up for own rights | ||
| Displays enthusiasm about doing things for self | ||
| Displays risk-free attitude in work | ||
| Reveals self in content of work | ||
| Work shows a sense of identity and individuality | ||
| Expresses satisfaction in work, confident self-esteem | ||
| Portrays self, family, world in work | ||
| Works shows child moving from egocentric view of self to an awareness of self as part of a larger society | ||
| Indicates favorite art medium/media | ||
| Reflection:
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|
SELF CARE |
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| Independently selects materials | ||
| Uses materials independently | ||
| Cleans up spills, messes | ||
| Writes name on work | ||
| Places finished product in proper place | ||
| Replaces materials in storage place | ||
| Washes and dries hands if necessary | ||
| Reflection:
|
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|
MEMORY AND ATTENTION SPAN |
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| Includes details in work from memories of experiences | ||
| Focuses attention on project to produce a finished work | ||
| Tunes out distractions of simultaneous play, talk, work | ||
| Reflection:
|
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|
CREATIVITY |
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| Uses materials in a novel way, displaying flexibility in seeing new possibilities in materials | ||
| Explores all facets of a medium | ||
| Draws from experiences to create representations | ||
| Incorporates creativity into other areas of play (constructing with blocks, drawing and constructing in dramatic play, forming designs in sand and other mediums) | ||
| Demonstrates creativity in secondary awareness (seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, tasting) | ||
| Reflection:
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|
EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE |
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| Uses work to express emotions of happiness, anger, fear | ||
| Verbalizes feelings about work | ||
| Enjoys manipulation and creation | ||
| Releases stressful feelings in a an appropriate manner/can control frustrations | ||
| Expresses anger in words rather than negative actions | ||
| Can be calmed in frightening situations | ||
| Shows fondness, affection, love towards others | ||
| Shows interest, excitement in classroom activities | ||
| Smiles, seems happy much of the time | ||
| Reflection:
|
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|
SOCIAL COMPETENCE |
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| Plays by self with own toys/materials | ||
| Shares materials and supplies | ||
| Plays parallel to others with similar toys/materials | ||
| Plays with others in group play | ||
| Works cooperatively with others on a joint project | ||
| Gains access to ongoing play in a positive manner | ||
| Makes friends with other children | ||
| Resolves play conflict in a positive manner | ||
| Engages in positive commentary on other children’s work | ||
| Participates in cooperative and collaborative work | ||
| Reflection:
|
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|
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT |
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| Controls whole body during work/in space that s/he is working | ||
| Runs with control over speed and directions | ||
| Climbs up, down, across climbing equipment | ||
| Throws, catches, and kicks balls | ||
| Turns knobs, lids, eggbeaters | ||
| Picks up and inserts objects with dexterity | ||
| Uses tools (scissors, hammer) with control | ||
| Squeezes glue bottle | ||
| Picks up small manipulatives/art materials with fingers | ||
| Manipulates clay or playdoh | ||
| Cuts with scissors | ||
| Reflection:
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|
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT |
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| Explores cause and effect and experimentation with variables in media (ex: sees differences in paint when water is added) | ||
| Observes similarities and differences, forming theories and testing them out by manipulating the medium | ||
| Classifies objects by shape, color, size | ||
| Places objects in a sequence or series | ||
| Recognizes, creates patterns | ||
| Counts by rote to 20 | ||
| Includes numerals and quantity in work | ||
| Displays 1-to-1 correspondence | ||
| Problem solves with concrete objects | ||
| Makes thinking visible | ||
| Displays knowledge of the concept of conservation | ||
| Reflection:
|
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SPOKEN LANGUAGE |
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| Listens but does not speak | ||
| Gives single-word, short phrase responses | ||
| Takes part in conversations | ||
| Speaks in expanded sentences | ||
| Asks questions | ||
| Can tell a story | ||
| Names scribbles, buildings, creations | ||
| Talks about work using vocabulary connected with materials and design | ||
| Uses language to describe process, intent and satisfaction with product | ||
| Vocabulary reflects knowledge of subject | ||
| Reflection:
|
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|
LITERACY, EMERGENT WRITING AND EMERGENT READING SKILLS |
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| Includes literacy in work | ||
| Recognizes the difference between drawing and writing | ||
| Pretends to write with drawings and scribbles | ||
| Makes horizontal lines of writing scribbles | ||
| Makes some letters, prints name or initial | ||
| Holds book right side up, turns pages right to left | ||
| Pretends to read using pictures to tell story | ||
| Shows awareness that print in a book tells a story | ||
| Knows the difference between text and illustrations | ||
| Reflection:
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ART, MUSIC AND DANCE SKILLS |
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| Draws, prints, paints and pastes | ||
| Makes basic scribble shapes | ||
| Draws person as sun-face with arms and legs | ||
| Makes pictoral drawings | ||
| Moves arms and hands in rhythm to beat | ||
| Plays rhythm instruments | ||
| Sings with group or by him/herself | ||
| Moves body to represent people, animals, feelings | ||
| Dances with others to music | ||
| Reflection:
|
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DRAMATIC PLAY SKILLS |
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| Does pretend play by him/herself | ||
| Assigns roles or takes assigned roles | ||
| Needs particular props to do pretend play | ||
| Takes on characteristics and actions related to role | ||
| Uses language for creating and sustaining the plot | ||
| Enacts exciting, danger-packed themes | ||
| Reflection:
|
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Resources:
I created this checklist using my experiences documenting children’s development along with guidance from two textbooks:
Beaty, J. (2013). Observing the development of the young child. (8th ed.). New York: Pearson.
Nilson, B. (2013). Week by week: Documenting the development of young children. (6th ed.). New York: Cengage.