Late childhood, from age eight to about 11, marks the end of slow growth and the beginning of physical and emotional changes leading up to puberty. Children become less self-centered, form closer friendships, and start to think logically. Parents and educators should reinforce correct behavior with praise.
Parents, clinicians, and educators try to stay abreast of key milestones children should achieve as they reach different ages. From age eight to about age 11, just before puberty begins, children undergo the physical and emotional developmental changes of late childhood. According to experts, this means they start to think slightly less self-centered, become more goal-oriented and form closer friendships with peers, although parents are likely still the central emotional ties. At this age, children are also expected to begin a new growth spurt leading up to their teenage years, during which they may find it difficult to stay in one place for too long.
According to The Ohio State University Extension, late childhood development marks the end of the period of slow growth between kindergarten and about the third grade — emotionally, physically, and intellectually. Until the end of the latter period, the children are likely to be quite uncoordinated and not grow that much. From the third or fourth grade through the end of middle school, however, children begin to grow more robust as adolescence progresses, with girls typically starting to mature slightly earlier than boys.
These sudden physical changes leading up to the puberty years of middle school and high school are often beset with embarrassment. This is true for those who are among the first to start experiencing physical changes. It is true even for those who are late in developing these changes.
Intellectually, late childhood development is characterized by a period around the end of elementary school and the beginning of middle school in which children stop thinking in absolute, concrete terms and develop more logical, “grey area” thinking. According to the Child Development Institute, children can begin multitasking effectively at this age. They are also likely to start thinking outside of their own experiences.
This shift from an egocentric perspective is the major emotional factor in late childhood development. Children are asked to start thinking independently of their own needs, often joining social groups and making more meaningful friendships. Practice becomes more than an understood effort. In late childhood development, children may lack proper identity and self-esteem, albeit due to an as yet inadequate understanding of themselves and society. This requires that parents and educators continue to reinforce correct behavior with abundant praise.
Later, in the teenage years, children begin the physical changes associated with puberty and an even more abstract way of thinking that allows them to grasp more formalized logic. This includes understanding that more than one answer can be true to a single question. Furthermore, the concepts of unknowns, reflected, for example, by the variables studied in algebra, can be understood more effectively.
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