(1) Simon (fake name) is a blond hair blue eyed 2 year old boy that seems happy- go- lucky and fairly bubbly. This observation took place at Simon's 2nd birthday party in his home. The party was truck

(1)

Simon (fake name) is a blond hair blue eyed 2 year old boy that seems happy- go- lucky and fairly bubbly. This observation took place at Simon's 2nd birthday party in his home. The party was truck themed and had lots of cool things like a mini ball pit and mini bounce house. When I arrived Simon said "party" to me a lot and was very smiley and giggly. His mom commented that he was chatty that day and then Simon said "I'm chatty" very loudly over and over for about the next 10 minutes or so. He also said "it's truck" several times. When his parents put him in the ball pit he flung his arms around and laughed whenever he popped a balloon or knocked a ball out of the pit. His parents laughed with him. His parents were encouraging and kind throughout the whole observation period. They encouraged play by asking him stimulating questions and playing alongside him. He clearly looked to his parents for guidance when faced with something new. For example, when he wanted to go into the ball pit he looked to his mom as if he was asking if it was okay. She told him to go on and have fun and he ran to the pit.

Simon had clearly been developing his fine motor development because he was able to rip open the paper on his presents after his mom showed him how. A child centered approach from the parents seemed evident as they let him take his time to independently open his presents even though it took longer than if his mom had just done it for him.

The concept of animism was present in Simon's cognitive function as well. He wanted to try a cherry tomato because he thought it was a berry. His parents told him it was sour, not sweet but he still wanted to try it. When he bit the tomato he threw it down and cried as if it had personally offended him. 

As for socioemotional development, the parents were definitely authoritative in that they placed boundaries on Simon but still allowed him to make a lot of decisions independently throughout the day. 

The only fault that I found in this method of observation was being unable to dig further into his thought process because I didn't want to ask questions or interrupt his natural existence. I kept wanting to talk to Simon and interact with him myself and had to keep reminding myself to stay in the background and watch from a distance.

(2)

I will be observing a 7-year-old Female that I will call Casey for this discussion.  Casey is almost 8 years old. I am going to meet them at a park where she goes at least one or two times a week. Casey is a home school student so her parents take her to meet up with her older cousins and sometimes-other kids that are homeschooled. I am not sure if they will be joining today. I did not make myself known so I am not sure if they attended or not. We met at the park at 6:45. Casey appeared to be happy to be there; she jumped right out of her vehicle and ran to play. She ran past kids that I would later find out t are her cousins. She was very excited.  

While observing Casey she shows cognitive development naturally in my opinion. I am starting to think that she might spend a lot of time with either adults or older kids. She understand the games and participated well. She understand the instructions and is able to give them to other her kids as well. She is also able to point out when the other kids are not playing the game correctly. In regards to socioemotional development Casey would spend most of her time with her cousins and play the games with them, but she would also lose interest in the games they were playing and wanted to play a game of hide and go seek. She had her feeling hurt that they would not stop the game they were playing and play hers. While she is explaining her feelings to the others another boy would come up and say he would like to play and so they went off to play her game. They ended up having another little boy join the game after about 10 minutes of playing. They seemed happy to all have someone to play with. I did not notice that the other little boys were there with anyone else. Another thing I was wonder as I observed Casey was if the fact that she is a home school student made any changes to the influences that school has on adolescents. I was wondering if her not being at school and spending most of her time with adults or older children had anything to do with the fact that she looked and spoke so much older than she was. She was communicating and understanding at a far more advanced level then the younger boys she was playing with. If I had not known her age and I was just making a guess I would say 10 to 12 years of age.

I felt like my location and observation went well. I was able to see how she interacted with not only people she knew, but also got to see how she made new friends. She loved the park and seems like it is something that she looks forward too. I do not think her or any of the other kids for that matter even noticed me. Casey seemed very sad to leave. I wondered if this is a usual thing for her. I am not saying homeschool is bad at all, I am just wondering if she yearns to be around other kids since she does not get to see them every day like kids that attend a campus. I wondered if this was the reason she was so upset to have to leave. I was also curious why she did not attend school, if this was something new with everything going on or a choice made prior.

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