FINAL EVALUATION

During the duration of my task, I feel I was the best when it came to having to participate in the Observations, and the analysis of the results of what Reece was capable to do. My weaknesses were having to think of tasks for Reece to do best suited to fit my questionnaire results of his likes/dislikes. So in order to get him to participate in the tasks I had to ensure he was interested. My initial research was very useful as the stuff in which I had wrote about helped me choose which aspects to study in my Observations, then leading me to pick physical/intellectual ’� which is in which what I based 3 activities of each on.
From my research and notes I’d researched through the internet and learnt from reading the book I managed to narrow it down to simple tasks in which a 3 year old would be able to manage with. From going into detail on my spider diagrams, I feel I managed to ensure I’d took into account all the possible things I could have planned for him to do.
I feel I could have found out more relevant information based around the topics of Physical and intellectual study, as I could have found more books to find out if there was any tasks I hadn’t thought of, which might have been better fitting. The information was pretty easy to gather having access to a range of books from School, Libraries and information from the Internet. There was never any precise information I could find in which I needed but as soon as I had a basic idea of a topic to develop I coped well in doing so.
When evaluating my observations I found my focussed research helpful, but still felt I needed to refer to a book occasionally to confirm that what I would expect a 3 year old to be able to do was correct, then needed to compare this to what a 4 year old would be able to do to see how advanced Reece is in his development. My focussed research helped me plan suitable observations neatly helping me to organise myself by ticking each one beside the ’�Aim’ to ensure I had done each of the supposed tasks. I feel that I knew enough during the period I had to do my focussed research plan, I don’t feel I would have been able to manage being even more well organised if I hadn’t made a previous outline plan showing what exactly I had chosen to explore, so I didn’t forget.
My observation plans were detailed enough to get me understanding exactly what I was going to do, how I was going to do it and what exactly I was going to be achieving from going so. I stuck to the plan as well as I could apart from when I was going to be doing a video recording as part of my Observation, I could not however manage to get hold of a video camera in time but I still managed to ensure I got pictures. The each of the sheets I wrote on one sheet ’�Physical’� and the other ’�Intellectual’� so that I made sure I wrote 3 of each on each sheet to make it an equal study of both, were as, if they were messed up dotted about on either sheet I would get confused when (if a problem occurred) I could refer to my contingency plans. I tried to write on each sheet that say if I were to do a Physical, my contingency plan was physical, same for Intellectual. I done this so that I each time I visited the child I was jumbling about my tasks which would only have gotten myself confused.
The tasks in which I chose for Reece to do were in fact well suited for him, and his - what can be - a quite stubborn personality. He seemed to enjoy doing most of them and helped me gain a quite substantial load of results. I particularly got some of the best evidence from when I had Reece walk up and down the stairs as it was a strong yes, that he could in-fact do it which was then proved by the amount of times he repeated it.
I didn’t change any of my observations, I only changed a book in which I was planning to read for one of the tasks, to a more suited ’� to his taste style of book.
The observation in which we took Reece to the park was particularly good as he enjoyed going on the swings, slides, climbing frames etc’� It was good having watched him having so much fun and also giving us the sufficient results having been able to balance and co-ordinate himself from each area at a time.
The methods I used to record were appropriate as I used filming (with the permission from the parents of course!) taking pictures to show him being able to look after himself, and writing plenty of notes which made it much easier when it came to writing it up. However, I could have done this better with more detailed notes.
The only problems that occurred was that Reece had read the book in which I chose for him many times before, so that had to be changed to get the best results, then again when the day we’d arranged to go to the park he decided he didn’t want to go to the park but this was soon no issue once a chocolate bar was involved.
I feel throughout I was quite organised but could have spaced a few of the last observations out a bit more as I then left myself in a rush, but still managed in the end. Collecting my equipment was easy as I have it all at home, all I needed was notebook, book (for one of the observations), and camera.
He was a suitable child to observe as we got on well, he was at a good age to be able to talk slightly and understand what you were saying; this especially helped when it came to asking him to walk up the stairs.
If I had to do this coursework again I think that I would have maybe studied a 4 or 5 year old instead as they can do better things when it comes to looking into the Physical aspects.

CONCLUSION

I think that I have answered ’�does a child learn through play’ as children learn their communication skills from being with other people whether it be Nursery, with Family etc’� So without much communication I wouldn’t have been able to gather much information. I think that a child learns through play as I’ve learnt that when children are younger they tend to imitate what others are doing so, such as, when we took Reece to the park, he’s seen people/friends go down slides in the past and has picked up on the idea of how to do it. Although, of course when he was younger he would have needed more help to do this. By getting children to be motivated and encouraging them, they want to (usually) do good to please you so that they would please you and then have a feeling of accomplishment.
I have learnt from this task that children at 3 years old are very intelligent being able to do some things at such a young age. I enjoyed getting Reece to do the tasks as he found them fun, sort of like a game. I was surprised at how further developed Reece appeared to be in most cases!