When I think of child development............

The following quotes about children and development serve as a reminder that each child is unique and develop at their own pace within nurturing relationships.

Development, it turns out, occurs through this process of progressively more complex exchange between a child and somebody else--e specially somebody who's crazy about that child.

                  - Urie Bronfenbrenner

Children allowed to develop at their own speed will usually win the race of life. 

                   - Fred O. Gosman

There’s one basic rule you should remember about development charts that will save you countless hours of worry…..The fact that a child passes through a particular developmental stage is always more important than the age of that child when he or she does it. In the long run, it really doesn’t matter whether you learn to walk at ten months or fifteen months – as long as you learn how to walk.

                      -Lawrence Kutner

 

Every child has an inner timetable for growth--a pattern unique to him. . . . Growth is not steady, forward, upward progression. It is instead a switchback trail; three steps forward, two back, one around the bushes, and a few simply standing, before another forward leap.

                      - Dorothy Corkville Briggs

Feelings of worth can flourish only in an atmosphere where individual differences are appreciated, mistakes are tolerated, communication is open, and rules are flexible - the kind of atmosphere that is found in a nurturing family.”

                     - Virginia Satir