Child Observation Paper

1800 Words4 Pages

In choosing participants to interview for this project, I decided to seek individuals who I have already bonded with, so that the participants would be comfortable answering my interview questions and also provide feedback with less hesitation. Therefore, I chose to select my five year old sister Grace, my eight year old brother Aiden, and my eighteen year old boyfriend Dean. Aiden and Grace are both Caucasian children who live in a middle class household with their mom, dad, and dog Piper. With my dad and step-mom’s permission, I interviewed both Aiden and Grace separately over Skype. I interviewed Aiden with both my dad and step-mom present while Grace was in another room and used the same format when interviewing Grace. However, Dean is …show more content…

So, as expected of a typical five year old, she could not sit in the same position to focus on answering the questions. When asked what her favorite activities were, her immediate response thought was that she loved to play outside. I then asked if there were any other activities that she liked to do she told me that she enjoyed games too. However Grace’s mother, who was present in the room for the duration of the interview, stated, “You do more than that, Grace. You like to read, do puzzles, play with dolls…” which Grace agreed with and repeated as her own answer (Grace’s mother, personal communication, 2016). Grace also told me “I’ll do anything that Aiden does,” referring to her older brother (Grace, personal communication, 2016). When asked to list some things she can do by herself, her first response was to tell me that she could do back flips in the pool and tie her own shoes. It seemed that she was responding to the question and bragging about all of her favorite abilities. Her mother again interjected and told me that she could also read some, help take care of her dog, brush her own teeth, and write her own name, which Grace again repeated as her mother listed her abilities. It’s clear that Grace’s interests are greatly influenced by imitation. This observation supports Bandura’s Social Learning Theory which states that “behavior is learned through observation.” (Feldman). Grace looks at her older family members’ physical interests and mimics what they encourage, which is normal for being in this age group and also being the youngest child. Her physical abilities are also in the range of what is expected at her

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