Developmental Milestones
Have you ever heard of the term developmental milestones? Chances are if you are a parent, educator, clinical practitioner, or simply someone interested in how humans learn and grow, you have come across this term at some point in your own journey. Without diving too deeply into the stages of development, this introduction to developmental milestones ensures that you have a foundational understanding of cognitive, linguistic, and social-emotional development for different stages. If you would like to learn more about developmental milestones, check out Understanding the Whole Child (eBook) or Child Growth and Development Canadian Edition (eBook).
Though much of this learning is geared towards educators, we encourage you to get curious about how these milestones may influence or impact you within your specific context, both inside and outside of the classroom. Specifically, the focus here is to help educators and those working in community with learners to consider strategies for supporting the practice of changemaking, especially for those of you working alongside youth.
Teaching the skills required for changemaking is a developmental process requiring you to meet learners where they are, in the here and now. Activities that consider the developmental needs of learners are more likely to move learners along the continuum of understanding. We encourage you to consider the development of those with whom you work as changemakers alongside their cognitive and emotional/social development.
Finally, though we may, at times, speak more generally of stages, we also recognize that individual learners will develop at their own pace and on their own timeline. We encourage you to keep the following principles of development in mind as proposed by Pye et al. (2022):
- Development is a lifelong process.
- Change will occur across the lifespan.
- Early childhood experiences impact future development.
- Development is multidirectional.
- Development is multidimensional including physical, cognitive, and social-emotional.
- Developmental milestones are influenced by socioeconomic status, parenting styles, lived experiences, as well as individual differences in cognitive processes.
