Summary: Physical Development
In this chapter, we learned about what makes up a human in their physical development; alleles, and dominant and recessive features. We also learned the stages of development, different body types, and puberty. With alleles, there are dominant and recessive. The allele that is dominant will always show up. The only way the recessive allele will physically show is if it is homozygous (both the alleles are the same). Some examples of dominant traits are: dark hair, freckles, and double-jointedness. Some examples of recessive traits are: blonde hair, thin lips, and attached earlobes. Moving on to the stages of development, there is prenatal, infant and toddler, early and middle childhood, and adolescent. Within all these stages are important factors with how a child develops. In the prenatal stage, it is important for mothers to stay away from teratogens (alcohol, drugs, pollution, etc). It is also important for a mother to bond with her newborn, giving it the ability to start trusting human beings. In the infant and toddler stage, nutrition and parenting is vital to how a child can grow up. This stage can determine whether or not the child grows up obese or even just distrusting. Fine and gross motor skills also develop during this stage so it is very important to get exercise. In early and middle childhood, motor skills such as running, jumping, hopping, and skipping develop. During adolescence, puberty, body image, eating disorders, and more arise. Puberty usually occurs at around 10.5 years of age for females and 11.5 years of age for males. This can also connect to a persons body image. A skinny, tall girl may being menstruation after a heavier set girl. This slim, tall body figure is called ectomorph, while someone with a more muscular body and broud shoulders and hips is a mesomorph. The third body image is an endomorph. Endomorphs are larger than the other two and typically have trouble losing weight while ectomorphs find it hard to gain weight. (Kiersky & Murrell, 2017)
Physical Development and My Development
Growing up I was always made fun of for being so skinny and short. Both of my parents are slim and short, my mom is 5’3″ weighing around 120 pounds while my dad is 5’9″ weighing around 150 pounds. I was destined to be small. When I played sports I did have muscle, but it was lean and you could not see it at all. After sports, I lost all my muscle but looked the exact same, only difference being I lost weight. Throughout the years I have tried very hard to gain weight. But, because I am an ectomorph, I have not been able to gain more than 3 pounds in over two years. My metabolism is so high so no matter what I eat or do, it basically cancels out. I started puberty when I was in middle school, which I was prepared for because, lucky me, my mother was the guidance counselor who showed every student in school “the video”. It was around the same age as me that everyone else started puberty as well. Also, I can tell that I possess so many dominant traits that my kids will have them as well. I have dark brown hair, with brown eyes, and I’m double jointed with some freckles.
Physical Development and My Work
This is the most important part of my intended profession. I will be working with children who are disabled, whether that be a speech impediment, a cognitive disability, or physical disability. I will need to know the importance of physical development to help them grow a little more normally than if they did not have me there. For example, if I have a child with a cognitive disability such as autism and the mother of this child is pregnant again, I can use my knowledge to tell her what might have gone wrong during the pregnancy and how to prevent any other disabilities in her next child. I can also use my knowledge to help children develop the way they should be if they are not getting enough exercise help from their parents, or even if they are not getting the proper nutrition. I can help inform the parents on how they can better their child’s development so it does not hurt them in the long run.
Picture Reference:
AK's Final Project EDPR 