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1.1 Birth
I was born at St. Joe's Hospital in Stockon in the middle of the afternoon. -
2.4 APGAR
Nicolai was 8 lbs, 5 ounces and 21 inches long, had pale pinkish skin, and temperature readings of 98.9 degrees which are all good signs of health. Based on the APGAR, he appeared very healthy. He showed good respiratory effort as seen by the reflexive cry and clear breathing; his muscle tone seemed good based on his exremely active head, hands, feet, and fingers, and on the body measurements; he responded reflexively to wiping of head and when his fingers were touched; I didn't get his HR. -
6.1- Basic and Self Conscious Emotions
I was a pacifier baby. As a few month old infant I would show basic emotions of joy when I was given a pacifier. That emotion was to some extent biologically determined because it appeared so early in infancy. Later as I approached two years old, I showed the self-conscious emotion of envy when I would see other babies with a pacifier and I didn't have one. I had to understand the other babies' perspectives in order to feel the emotion of envy. -
7.2- Exosystem
My dad got breast cancer in 1989 (though not before I was born it's before I remember so I don't consider it as my microsystem). Ever since then my parents put extra stress on having premium health insurance and on having good health. My parents pay top dollar through my mom's insurance to not have premiums or copays so I've had the luxury of never worrying about medical bills or where to go when I am injured. My parents also raised me to be very active and eat healthy. -
4.2- First Word
I just called my mom and she painfully told me that my first words were "dada." She reckoned that my actual first words were likely nominals after I asked her about them, but she couldn't remember exactly when I would have said those. The word "dada" is a form of canonical babbling that starts around 7 months. It's hard to know if babbling "dada" had any significance toward my dad or not, because babbling occurs with most infants and is thought to be linked to biological factors, not environment -
7.1- Parental Strategies
My mom said I was a biter and until I was five (well beyond Freud's oral stage). The only time she ever used physical punishment was making me eat red peppers when I would bite people, but she also used other techniques like talking to me about why it's wrong to bite and how it harms other people. After many biting incidents she attributed it to being because I wanted to harm people though I knew better and that it was intentional. That probably pushed her to her upper limit of tolerance. -
5.1- Kohlberg's and Gender
Parker acknowledges that she and others are either a "man" or a "lady," which is a sign of gender identity. This is something Parker would have acquired between the ages of two and three. Parker seems easily able identify men and women who are older than her, but seems unable to tell the difference between boys and girls here own age. Based on this I would say she is understanding gender stability, but she doesn't understand the determinants of sex. I would guess she's 4 because of this. -
4.1- Memory
My first memory is riding my tricycle off of a small bike jump that my brother and his friends made. I went so slowly my front tire went over the lip and I fell head-over-handles onto the ground. I don't know why this is my first memory, but the theory that hits home the most with me is that we are only able to tell our "life story" after understanding something about the general form that stories take. In this story I had just turned four and had started to understand the form of story telling. -
3.1- Preoperational Magnetism
Becuase children probably have never developed a schema about "invisible powers" like magnetism, I would first let kids play with magnets to see how they work and start developing a schema. Then I ask the children to verbally explain what's happening to see if they can use symbolic thought to explain. Next I would have the kids pretend play as if they were magnets. I would put a "+" on their fronts and a "-" on their backs and say that +s attract minus -s, but +s wth +s and -s with -s push away. -
6.2- Self Control
Ever since I can remember it's been a family tradition to open one Christmas present each on Christmas Eve. When I was five apparently I had decided to open more than one present-- I had tracked down more like five before my parents found me. Though this wasn't a delay-of-gratification task because I did not receive a desired outcome for waiting, I demonstrated poor self control. I did not meet my parents demands for appropriate behavior. -
5.2- Encouraging Gender Schemas
Adults encourage gender schemas in the classroom. One of the most obvious is having separate bathrooms for boys and girls, though this is not specific to schools. Teachers often let kids have options for PE classes where they self-segregate themselves. The boys may choose to play touch footbal while the girls may choose to walk the track. Some classes do dancing and have male and female partners. Uniforms are another example; girls often wear skirts and stalkings while boys wear pants. -
2.1- Passive Gene Environment
My mom had exposed me and my brother to playing music at an early age. As a child, she had played the piano and sang often and continued this into her adult life. We had a piano in our living room and grandma had a grand piano in hers. By the time I was 8, my brother had been playing piano and clarinet, so it was natural for me to start taking piano lessons. I didn't particularly want to play piano but it was part of the parent-shaped environment I grew up in so I did. -
3.2- Concrete Magnetism
Children in the concrete operations stage need to see things and think of them in ways that make sense with how the view the world. Because of this, lecturing about the science behind magnetism (which they can't see) will be over their heads. Children this age would benefit with physically using magnets and trying to use them on lots of different objects, like nails, plastic, coins, bookshelves, etc. Then they can concretely understand magnetisms attraction to certain metal. -
6.3- Foreclosure
Growing up, my religious beliefs fell into the foreclosure category. I was Catholic because my dad was Catholic. I went to church weekly because I had to. I blindly recited the prayers, alter served without knowing the signifance of the different parts of mass, and sang songs that I didn't fully understand. But I was Catholic and believed in the basic teachings of Catholicism that I understood. I wasn't too familiar with other religions, nor did I care to be, because I identified as a Catholic. -
8.1- Children and Television
I recall being at family friends' house when I was about ten and the older kids were watching Married With Children. I thought it was a big deal that the parents let me watch it which is why I remember it. The older kids thought the show was hilarious and my childhood friend Katie and I couldn't understand why. We quickly left to some other activity. We could understand implicit content since we were ten and used to TV shows, but not the explicit content and quickly lost interest in the show. -
3.3- Imaginary Audience
During sixth grade, I got my first retainer for my upper teeth. Unfortunately the orthodontist mixed up my mold with a little girls and I ended up with sparkles and puppy sticker in my retainer. Though nobody would probably ever see my retainer, I was self conscious about how others would scrutinize and judge me for having such a girly retainer. I "accidently" lost my retainer in the garbage one lunch, much to my parents' (and their wallets') dismay. -
7.4- Friendship
I had known Gavin since I was ten, but we didn't become friends until we started middle school. I don't even think we really liked each other prior to then. When we entered middle school we were both social and probably considered at least somewhat popular. I think our concern for acceptance and insecurity of peer rejection led us to become friends more than anything. Like many kids in middle childhood we gossiped a lot. After a few years we had gained a lot of trust and loyalty in eachother. -
8.2- School Transitions
As I've already mentioned, I went from Brookside Elementary to Sierra Middle School between 6th and 7th grade. This was probably the time for me of greatest transition in school. The 6th grade class at Brookside was about 60 students and the 7th grade class at Sierra was probably 250+. I went from spending nearly a whole day with the same 30 students to changing classmates every period and having electives. Leaving a K-8 school, there was also more pressure to adopt dating activities. -
1.2 Theories
I started at Sierra Middle after attending Brookside Elementary. The first weeks of school were the time in my life when I had the largest issues with identity. I had transfered schools with few friends, all of whom were upper-middle class white kids, and entered an environment of fairly extreme diversity. I was a prep from Brookside who swam competitively and played tennis. Erikson would see this as an emotional challenge that I had to overcome through relationships that shaped my development. -
3.4- Personal Fable
My older brother and my parents didn't always get along while he was in high school. I clearly remember one of their arguments (over grades, curfew, or something teenagers and parents argue over) ending with my brother yelling: "You don't know what it's like to be a teenager in the '90s!" I think the argument ceased because my parents and I were laughing like crazy. My brother thought his high school experience was unique and that my parents couldn't possibly understand him. -
2.3- Evocative Gene Environment
I was a gifted baseball player growing up. I attribute much of my success to genetics: I grew faster than most of my friends, had an "active" pitchers arm (as coaches call it), and had a good mental focus for pitching and hitting. Just before I turned 13 my coaches had selected me to play on an older competitive team and my dad had supported that decision based on my previous success. I was given an opportunity to enhance my game because of prior success and vastly improved that season. -
7.3- Crowds and Cliques
I was part of a freshman baseball clique of about seven or eight guys at my high school. We not only played ball together daily, but went to the bowling alley every Friday night for Rock'n'Bowl. We had intimate friendships and had a lot in common including classes and hobbies. During middle school I was considered a prep by many of my peers since I wore Polo shirts and played tennis. This was a crowd I was in. I didn't interact with all of the other preps, but we shared a stereotype. -
6.4- Moratorium
Near the end of high school, I stopped agreeing with the Catholic church on a variety of issues. I had started to develop my own social beliefs. I still went to church because it made dad happy, but my mind was constantly thinking about the issues being brought up and I had lots of cognitive dissonance. I wasn't sure if I wanted to believe the church's interpretation of the scriptures or if I even wanted to believe that the scriptures were true. My religious identity was lost. -
2.2- Active Gene Environment
In the summer between my junior and senior year of high school I went to Houston for a 10-day conference for students interested in the field of medicine. I was nervous about how much I'd have in common with lots of the people at the conference and who I'd hang out with. On day one I actively sought out people who I considered to be like myself: outgoing, sociable, and athletic. These new friends were compatible with my genotype and hanging out with them reinforced how I identified myself. -
1.3 Methods
I'm a physical therapy doctoral student studying the affects of traumatic frontal lobe damage on gross motor control in infants. As infants won't understand my words, I use lights, sounds, and visuals to induce the desired movements, as in the conditioned head turn. I invite the infants' parents into the room to make the situation comfortable for the infant and make sure the parents understand the study and consent. I sit in a low-to-the-ground chair to make the infant feel comfortable.
