Gross Motor Observation

Date: November 6th 2008
Time: 1:00 to 3:00 P.M.
Childs Name: Girl
Birthday: 12-29-2003
Age: Almost 5



The girl I choose to observe is turning 5 next month so I decided to observe both the 4 and 5 year old gross motor skills. The observation takes place at a childcare center first half hour is outside second hour and a half is inside. Its cold outside and it's snowing a little all the children are excited to be out playing in the snow.



I wanted to see the children perform the list of gross motor activity's naturally so I gave a copy to the teacher and talked to her about incorporating the ones i didn't see into the children's normal activity's, while i observed my one child.



While outside I observed the girl play on the jungle gym, she climbs the rope ladder very easily she could also run, start, stop and move around everything very easily. She has very good agility skills. After getting down from the jungle gym she begins to play tag with a group of children as she is running away from her friends I see her jump over a sandbox pail land on both feet and then keep running. The teacher asks if their is any children that would like to play catch with her. The girl I'm observing is one of the children to play catch she can easily throw overhand and out of the five throws from the teacher shes able to catch three of them. The ball is about the size of a softball and its soft plastic. The teacher goes to attend a hurt child and the group of children go their own ways playing. On the way back to the classroom the teacher asks all the children to skip. The teacher along with all the children skip for a little bit. The girl skips easily and says to a child by here "no this is how you do it" and shows the child how to skip. Next the teacher asks the children to count to ten while hopping the girl can also do this easily. I was also able to observe the girl touch her toes without bending her knees, she was able to walk upstairs easily with alternating feet. Walking backwards heel to toe was difficult but after a few trys she was able to do it. The girl could also easily hop on one foot. The four year old gross motor skills were much easier than the five year old ones.