[Xmca-l] Critical Periods of Development

[Andy Blunden]

I have changed the subject line, Greg, because I think the issues you 
raise are relatively remote from the issues raised in the "ideal head" 
thread.
The question of "critical periods of development" came to the fore again 
for me in relation to recent discussions about the concept of 
perezhivanie, a discussion which included Russians, who see 
perezhivanija as relevant only to development during adulthood. 
English-speakers have never taken perezhivanie in that way, taking it to 
cover the active relation of any subject to their environment and the 
emotion-laden experiences that are associated with critical periods of 
development in childhood, and only secondarily in adulthood.

In my view, the place of those experiences which adults have when 
finding themselves in impossible positions and which stimulate them to 
make a personal development, are symmetrical in many ways with the 
experiences of children when they experience a "rite of passage", taking 
up a different role in the family, with new needs met in new ways and 
subject to new expectations. Vygotsksy theorizes these crises in terms 
of "social situation of development" - a form of words which could 
equally apply to adults - such periods being terminated by periods of 
critical development, i.e., leaps.

There is a difference though. (1) For a child the key problem is 
becoming an adult and gaining the kind of mediated independence 
associated with being a 'sovereign', adult citizen of a community, 
whereas for the adult, who has already achieved that, the problem is 
indeterminate and diverse, arising usually when their life as it has 
hitherto gone along meets up with some barrier or conflict. (2) A child 
is not capable, it is said, of the kind of protracted working over of 
experiences and conscious restructure of their relationship to the 
world, alone; in general that role is fulfilled by adult carers who, 
once the child has thrown off their former role, constitute a new social 
position for the child by means of new expectations placed upon the 
child, a social position into which the child must grow.

Now I am not a psychologist and all I can do is interpret what I read 
from others, but that's how I see the situation. But these propositions 
are falsifiable and I expect child psychologists would want to test 
them. For my part, on the basis of my own experience as an adult who has 
been involved in organisations which demanded personal development from 
their members, I am comfortable that the concept of perezhivanie matches 
my experiences.

Andy

------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/


Greg Thompson wrote:
> Mike, Helena, Andy and others,
> I wonder if this passage from Vygotsky's the problem of Age can help in
> thinking about the problem:
> "The second feature of critical age levels served as a departure point for
> empirical study. The fact is that a significant proportion of children who
> experience critical periods of development are difficult children. These
> children seem to drop out of the system of pedagogical influence that until
> very recently provided a normal course for their training. and education.
> In children of school age during critical periods, there is a drop in rate
> of success, a slacking of interest in school work, and a general decline in
> capacity for work. At critical age levels, the child’s development
> frequently is accompanied by more or less sharp conflicts with those around
> him. The child’s internal life is sometimes connected with painful and
> excruciating experiences and with internal conflicts."
>
> Although frankly, I'm not sure what is meant by "critical periods of
> development" and/or by "difficult children" (that second sentence baffles
> me). Help would be welcome here!
>
> Andy, maybe you can help? (Andy has been helping me understand this essay
> offline).
>
> -greg
>
>   
>