Module 2: Evaluating your Child
Page Outcomes [edit | edit source]
When you have finished this workshop, you should:
- have a clearer understanding about development in children and be able to explain this to someone else.
- You should be able to observe a / your child with cerebral palsy, and show where on the development chart she is.
- You should be able to show which activities could be suitable for a / your child to learn next.
Now think about other children in your family, or in your neighbourhood. Think about what skills they first learnt as they grew and developed?
Now look at these four sentences that talk about different types of skills.
- Communication
- Self-care activities such as eating, dressing, toileting
- Moving around from place to place
- Walking (if possible)
Being able to communicate in some way with others, allows us to have and build a relationshipwith them. A child with a disability can learn to help with self-care skills even if she is not able to move around from place to place, or walk.
ALL children have the potential to learn and develop these skills through a sequence of steps. BUT, each child will learn and develop at her own pace and in her own way. Before you can look at how a child has developed, we need to understand how development usually happens. These pictures show the sequence in which children usually develop some of their movements. But children don’t just develop their muscles, or movements, they also develop in communication, in their social and emotional skills like selfcare activities and relating to others, and in their thinking and playing. This development will carry on, unless something happens or is missing to stop or slow the development.
These skills include:
Movement:
- Large muscles for sitting, standing, walking, running.
- Small muscles for pointing, picking up things, feeding self, enjoying water and sand, feeling objects etc
