This paper reports a study which examined the relationships of various facets of sensorimotor performance to abilities measured by a developmental examination of a sample of full-term and pre-term infants nine months after expected term date. This study addressed three questions: (1) Are there differences in the sensorimotor development of term…

Examined infants' ability to retrieve an object from atop a slightly larger object. Found that even 5-month-olds could retrieve objects close in size and fully contiguous with their bases when demands on reaching skill were reduced. Proposed that when they fail this task, it is because they lack the skill to reach the top object without…

The author notes that teachers who continually require students to sit still and stop talking apparently prefer to teach a grove of trees rather than a classroom full of students. School environments should be designed to enhance the development of student brains -- and student brains are about movement, not motionless stagnation. 21st century…

Sports-related tool use abilities in children were investigated within a neo-Piagetian framework of development. The object was to establish whether development in the motor domain proceeds in a "stage-like" fashion. A model was developed which suggested how general and precise structural changes might manifest themselves in the sub-domain of tool…

This book presents a comprehensive and detailed theory of early human development based on the principles of dynamic systems theory. It raises fundamental questions about prevailing assumptions in the field and proposes a new theory of the development of cognition and action, unifying recent advances in dynamic systems theory with current research…

Seven sequential ordinal scales of sensorimotor development are briefly described. These scales permit modification in the strategy for assessing infant development, investigating its structure and investigating infant-environment interaction. (GO)

An experiment demonstrating that children in Piaget's preoperational stage, who generally still cannot give conceptually correct answers to questions about rate and time, evidence an ability to imitate a given rate-time relationship demonstrated by the experimenter. (ST)

Movement is motivated, encouraged, and governed by psycho-social development, motor development, and humanistic principles as well as by exercise physiology and kinesiology. The Basic Stuff series identifies the body of knowledge which underlies purposeful movement and can be integrated into concept or fundamental skill curricula. (JN)

Effects of sensorimotor training on intelligence and adaptive skills of 40 profoundly retarded adult residents of a state institution were investigated during a six-month intensive training program. (Author)

Compared coupling characteristics of clapping simultaneous with walking or galloping, consistency across trials, and phasing variability among 4-, 6-, 8-, and 10-year-olds. Found that for walk/clap tasks, children adopted adult-like coupling patterns by age 8 and with the same consistency by age 10. Across age, children became less variable in…

Twelve mute children (4-12 years old), diagnosed as autistic, were studied in order to describe their sensorimotor functioning and to relate their sensorimotor performance to nonverbal communication and cognitive development. (Author/BD)

Intended for parents and teachers of multiply handicapped preschool children, the booklet provides lesson plans in three major areas--basic concepts, motor activities, and language activities. Each lesson plan is broken down into four parts: purpose (a descriptive statement of what the lesson hopes to accomplish), materials (list of materials…

Past studies in child development have clearly established that motor development is the basis for later, higher-order developmental processes. The motor developmental approach to learning focuses on the acquisition of skills and concepts in various academic subjects through motor activities. It is based partly on the theory that children, being…

Describes an empirical study that examined the impact of being carried on a parent's back on a child's visual integration pathways. Draws on a previous study (Pretorius et al.) postulating that this cultural behavior could have a negative impact as it prevents the child from crawling adequately or enough during the sensorimotor stage. (Author)