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CHILDHOOD AND LEARNING.

CHILDHOOD :The time during which one is a child, from between infancy and
puberty.Childhood is the age span ranging from birth to adolescence. According to Piaget's theory
of cognitive development, childhood consists of two stages: preoperational stage and concrete
operational stage. In developmental psychology, childhood is divided up into the developmental
stages of toddlerhood, early childhood, middle childhood, and adolescence,although the focus of
this work shall be on primary school students that is (1-12)years old and this can be sectioned to
early childhood and middle childhood only. Society's ideas about childhood shift over time, and
research has led to new understandings of the development that takes place in each stage.
Early Childhood (Birth to Eight Years)
Early childhood is a time of tremendous growth across all areas of development. The dependent
newborn grows into a young person who can take care of his or her own body and interact
effectively with others. For these reasons, the primary developmental task of this stage is skill
development.

Physically, between birth and age three a child typically doubles in height and quadruples in
weight. Bodily proportions also shift, so that the infant, whose head accounts for almost one-
fourth of total body length, becomes a toddler with a more balanced, adult-like appearance.
Despite these rapid physical changes, the typical three-year-old has mastered many skills,
including sitting, walking, toilet training, using a spoon, scribbling, and sufficient hand-eye
coordination to catch and throw a ball.Between three and five years of age, children continue to
grow rapidly and begin to develop fine-motor skills. By age five most children demonstrate fairly
good control of pencils, crayons, and scissors. Gross motor accomplishments may include the
ability to skip and balance on one foot. Physical growth slows down between five and eight years
of age, while body proportions and motor skills become more refined.

Physical changes in early childhood are accompanied by rapid changes in the child's cognitive and
language development. From the moment they are born, children use all their senses to attend to
their environment, and they begin to develop a sense of cause and effect from their actions and the
responses of caregivers.Over the first three years of life, children develop a spoken vocabulary of
between 300 and 1,000 words, and they are able to use language to learn about and describe the
world around them. By age five, a child's vocabulary will grow to approximately 1,500 words.
Five-year-olds are also able to produce five-to seven-word sentences, learn to use the past tense,
and tell familiar stories using pictures as cues.the eight-yearold still reasons in concrete ways and
has difficulty understanding abstract ideas.
From ages three to five, growth in socioemotional skills includes the formation of peer
relationships, gender identification, and the development of a sense of right and wrong. Taking the
perspective of another individual is difficult for young children, and events are often interpreted in
all-or-nothing terms, with the impact on the child being the fore-most concern

Middle Childhood (Eight to Twelve Years)

more recent theorists have recognized the importance of middle childhood for the development of
cognitive skills, personality, motivation, and inter-personal relationships. During middle childhood
children learn the values of their societies. Thus, the primary developmental task of middle
childhood could be called integration, both in terms of development within the individual and of
the individual within the social context.

Perhaps supporting the image of middle childhood as a latency stage, physical development during
middle childhood is less dramatic than in early childhood or adolescence. Growth is slow and
steady until the onset of puberty, when individuals begin to develop at a much quicker pace. The
age at which individuals enter puberty varies, but there is evidence of a secular trend–the age at
which puberty begins has been decreasing over time. In some individuals, puberty may start as
early as age eight or nine. Onset of puberty differs across gender and begins earlier in females.
As with physical development, the cognitive development of middle childhood is slow and steady.
Children in this stage are building upon skills gained in early childhood and preparing for the next
phase of their cognitive development. Children's reasoning is very rule based. Children are
learning skills such as classification and forming hypotheses. While they are cognitively more
mature now than a few years ago, children in this stage still require concrete, hands-on learning
activities. Middle childhood is a time when children can gain enthusiasm for learning and work,
for achievement can become a motivating factor as children work toward building competence
and self-esteem.

Middle childhood is also a time when children develop competence in interpersonal and social
relationships. Children have a growing peer orientation, yet they are strongly influenced by their
family. The social skills learned through peer and family relationships, and children's increasing
ability to participate in meaningful interpersonal communication, provide a necessary foundation
for the challenges of adolescence.

Drama in Education
Drama in education according to the Wikipedia Encyclopedia (2013) is the use of drama
techniques to support learning in the classroom. Drama in education was at first called creative
dramatics by Winifred Ward. By creative dramatics she meant a classroom teaching method that
emphasizes selfexpression, training in spoken English and literature appreciation. creative
Drama, is an informal, improvisational, non- exhibitional, process centered form of drama in
which participants are guided by a leader to imagine, enact, and reflect upon human experiences
through role play, improvisation, pantomime, movement, and sound.
Creative Dramatics is thus incorporating theatrical components and dramatic exploration into
educational settings to support the child‘s natural tendency to learn through play.Creative Drama
is a distinct discipline, art form, teaching tool and educational process for teaching and learning; it
is a hybrid between theatre and education. However, in recent time, the term covers a wide range
of activities that applied drama / theatre practices in the course of instructing, enlightening and
creating awareness about an idea or concept. Thus different nomenclature of drama / theatre
evolved: community theatre/ theatre for development-development drama, educational drama /
educational theatre, young peoples‘ theatre, informal drama, process drama, and framed
expertise. Drama in education differs from theatre that is performed as scripted dialogue on a
set in front of an audience. The most distinctive characteristic of creative dramatics is the lack of
scripts. As part of drama in education, the entire class often plays improvised roles within an
imagined context. As a result, there is no sharp distinction between actor and audience, the learner
is both participant and observer. Practitioners of drama in education often note their emphasis of
process over product to explain their approach. While in a stage theater production the focus is
more on rehearsal as a means to an end, the ultimate performance, in drama education, the
process is the end in itself. Students learn as a result of the choices and decisions they make
during the development or improvisation. The classroom teacher facilitates the drama by
building on the actions and reactions of students and changing the imagined context so as to
create an episodic sequence of dramatic action. There are a number of benefits of drama in
education. Creative dramatics helps students develop interpersonal skills. Research has shown
that cooperation among students increases when creative dramatics is used in classroom. In
creative dramatics, students also often enter into leadership roles while they plan activities,
such as scriptwriting and informal performances. Creative dramatics helps students
understand other cultures as they play the roles of people in these cultures or create
narratives about these cultures. Through such activities students also develop empathy
because they see characters from different perspectives. Creative dramatics promote tolerance.
Creative dramatics gives students an opportunity to understand other disciplines such as
history, social studies, citizenship education language studies, literature etcetera from different
perspectives as well as to explore ideas from multiple angles. Thus, it fosters critical
thinking. In creative dramatics, students and educators have various options such as role-
playing, acting, movement, scriptwriting, technical theater, and improvisation. Students who
have engaged in creative dramatics are willing to take more risks. While students tend to
feel anxious about creative activities initially, they gradually become more self-confident.
Idogho: Drama/Theatre in Education & Theatre as an Academic Discipline Creative dramatics
helps improve students' attitude toward school and the way they perceive themselves.
Research shows a decrease in absenteeism among students who engage in creative
dramatics. Creative dramatics can also improve student comprehension of the material in
class as it helps students learn content, writing, and drama simultaneously. Teachers use
creative dramatics to help students develop a greater vocabulary and improved word
recognition. Students' listening skills, oral expression, and writing skills are also improved
thanks to creative dramatics. Creative dramatics can facilitate learning of foreign languages.
Students can perform plays in the language they are learning in school. By practicing their
speaking skills in a foreign language in an environment where the instructor can provide
feedback, students develop confidence in their foreign language abilities. Educational Theatre:
This could also implies Performances of plays by professional actors in school or
community settings aimed at young people and with a specific educational aim, often
supported by Theatre in the institution of higher listening and resource material and
sometimes including a participatory workshop. Young People’s Theatre: Plays designed for
children of a specific age-range, which do not aim to address a single issue. Often based
on traditional stories, these plays offer a much broader base of follow-up opportunities in
schools than traditional Theatre in the institution of learning. They are often suitable as
family shows in smaller theatre venues, as well as for touring schools. Though, these are
not very common in Nigeria. Children’s Theatre: Usually performances targeted at younger
pupils in schools or theatre buildings. The content is likely to be instructional and
entertaining in nature and the performance will seek some token involvement from the
audience. Theatre-in-Health Education: Programmes of work that may use performances,
in-role participatory workshops and/or active learning techniques to deliver precisely
targeted Health Education objectives. 242 Copyright © IAARR 2013: www.afrrevjo.net/ijah