Running head: PEPSI Screening 1
PEPSI Screening
Nazanin Monajemi
College of Southern Nevada
PEPSI Screening
PEPSI Screening 2
In this project, the participant was a seven years old girl who is living in the United States
for three years with her parents. She and her parents are from Iran and migrated to the United
States about one year ago in 2018. They talk mostly Persian or Farsi at home and English is their
second language. Her parents do not talk English fluently and she does not have any siblings so
participant only has the opportunity to learn and English fluently at school.
When participant came to the United States, She was six years old and she needed to go to
the first grade, but because of her language and because she was not able to talk or understand any
English her school decided that she go to the kindergarten. At first, it was really hard for her
because she could not communicate with her peers and teachers but after four-month she was able
to talk and understand more English in the school and now and now participant is able to speak
both languages fluently and today she has no problem in the first grade class in the school in
understanding English.
Participant’s parents are a middle-class family. They are living in Houston, [Link]
they were immigrants, at first it was really hard for this family to adapt with the different country
and the new culture, especially for the participant because as soon as she came to the country
parents put her at school and she had very hard time to get used to it and learn English and be able
to communicate with others. Her parents which are my friends told me that at the beginning she
really missed her friends and her family in Iran. But as the time passing this situation started to get
better and her parents really try to do everything to meet her needs and improve her cognitive and
social and emotional skills.
Physical Development
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Participant’s physical appearance matched with what you would expect from a seven-year-
old. She is 46.4 lb and 48.4 inches which shows are that she is taller than her peers in the same
age. According to Developmentally Appropriate Practice book “the average of primary graders
(6-7 years old) in the United States weigh about 45 pounds and is just over 3.5 feet tall (Bredekamp
& Copple, 2013, P. 261). Accordingly, the participant has grown very well and even better than
other children of her age.
Participant’s fine motor skills were well-developed and she had no problem in writing and
other fine motor works like playing with puzzles and coloring. In this case participant’s skills is
more developed than her same-aged peers because according to Psychology Applied to Teaching
book, “in primary grades large-muscle control is still superior to fine coordination. Many children,
especially boys, have difficulty manipulating a pencil.” (McCown $ Snowman, 2015, P.84)
Participant’s gross motor skills and large muscles developed very well. She is very active
and can run very fast. Also, she is a great dancer and her body is very flexible that shows how her
small and large muscles grow. Based on Burns and Fu’s article, motor skills in primary graders
are developing with the progression of age (Fu & Burns, 2018, P.18) so technically I can say
participant's motor skills grew very well and it can compare with older kids.
Emotional Development
As it is mentioned in Developmentally Appropriate Practice book, “children by age 7 or 8,
usually have more awareness of the others feelings and perspective, and they understand that
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people think about what others are thinking. Also, they understand that they can feel two emotions
at the same time (Bredekamp $ Copple, 2013, P.268). I can say the participant had very good skills
to understand those emotions. When I was talking to the participant about her friends, she told me
that she likes to play with one of her classmates but sometimes she becomes very mean and
participant prefers to play alone. Also when I asked about her feeling, she told me that sometimes
she gets mad at her mom and dad and they know that and try to be more kind to her. As you can
see in her response, the participant can explain her emotions and also the other feelings very well.
Children in the primary grades have good self-regulation skills. According to Effective
Practice in Early Childhood Education, “Children become capable of setting standards for their
own behavior and comparing their performance to that other” (Bredekamp, 2017, P.103). I saw
this skill in participant when she was trying to do her homework and prepare everything for the
school.
Although in the primary grades, students are sensitive to criticism and may have difficulty
in adjusting the failure (McCown $ Snowman, 2015, P.86), I noticed that this sense in participant
was more than usual. She was too worried about what her classmates and teachers might think
about her and that worries, made her too quiet and shy in the classroom and she usually did not
participate in group discussions in the classroom and it made her develop inferiority more than
industry.
Philosophical Development
As claimed by Developmentally Appropriate practice book, “the cognitive changes that
have occurred by about age 7 have important implications for children’s moral development. As
their reasoning improves and their ability to understand multiple perspectives increases, children
become better able to think about and reflect on rules of behavior and to understand right and
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wrong (Bredekamp $ Copple, 2013, P.276). Based on this information, I noticed that the
participant had a good level of oral skills. She could distinguish between right and wrong and she
was really trying to follow the thing that she thought they are right.
As I mentioned before, participant thought that being mean with friends is a wrong manner
and she was trying to avoid it. According to ESE 504 website, “children on age seven tend to hold
a single absolute idea of appropriate behavior” (Ellsworth, 1998), so even when her friend was
kidding participant was avoiding her because she thought it was not proper behavior.
BredeKamp in Effective Practice in Early Childhood Education mentioned that “ During
the elementary school children begin to compare themselves to others and are more capable of
judging their own performances (Bredekamp, 2017, P.84). Participant showed that she judges her
performance a lot and also she compared herself with her peers to determine how her performance
is good and if she thought it was not good not she would try her best again to do a better job. Based
on all these data I think participant’s philosophical skills developed very well and she is where she
should be.
Social Development
As I mentioned before, the participant was very worried about how her classmates and her
teacher think about her she was worried about their judgment. BredeKamp claimed that “during
elementary school, children’s spheres expand, and the opinions of teachers and peers become more
important and parents’ less so. School work becomes a major part of children’s lives, and they
begin to find satisfaction in achievement and in mastering new skills. When children’s
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accomplishments are not up to their standards, they may develop a sense of inferiority
(Bredekamp, 2017, P.84). As I observed, the participant had very good physical, cognitive and e
philosophical skills, but because of the lack of self-confident, she showed the sense of inferiority
a lot.
According to Developmentally Appropriate Practice book, “primary grade children are
very interested in their peers’ opinions and abilities and they are better able than before to
cooperate and engage each other in extended conversations and rich social interaction.”
(Bredekamp $ Copple, 2009, P.265) The participant was in poor level in this situation, she was
avoiding to have a strong conversation with peers and even the teacher and she had not very strong
social interaction with her peers.
The participant had a very low amount of friends in the school (only one). Although it is
mentioned in Psychology Applied to Teaching book that “children become somewhat more
selective in their choice of friends and are likely to have a less permanent best friend (McCown $
Snowman, 2015, P.85), it’s rare to only have one best friend in this age. Based on this data, I think
the participant needs more support and improvement in this area.
Intellectual Development
Piaget’s Concrete Operational Stage argues that “During the elementary school years,
children’s thinking becomes more logical and they are able to solve problems mentally and reverse
operations.” (BredeKamp, 2017, P.90) The participant had very good skills in this area and as I
observed, she was able to solve problems in a very logical way. For example, she needed to draw
some shapes for her homework and she could not remember all kind of shapes that she had learned
so she decided to bring some books and look at them find more shapes.
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The participant usually was asking about the reason for the things and if you wanted to
give her a response you better to had enough evidence and she was able to find the relation between
her questions and shreds of evidence. Based on cognitive characteristics for primary graders which
are mentioned in Psychology Applied to Teaching book, “When an observation can be explained
with either a possible explanation or an evidence-based explanation, primary grade children
usually prefer the explanation with evidence (McCown $ Snowman, 2015, P.87).
Participant showed very good skills in cognitive development like classification, math, the
concepts of long and short, seriation, sequencing, science, and reasoning. According to
Developmentally Appropriate Practice, children in primary grades are improving all those skills
like concept acquisition and reasoning and also math skills (Bredekamp $ Copple, 2009, P.272-
273).
PEPSI Chart showing participant’s development
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Recommendations
Social and Emotional development: The areas that participant need more support with them
are social and emotional. She had some anxiety to communicate with classmates and teacher and
also she had a lack of self-confident. For these developmental stages, I would recommend parents
to put her or ask her to participate in some social activities in the school. For example, participating
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in dance performance could be a great idea because she was very good at dancing and doing such
a skill that she is very good at it can help her to find her lost self-confident. Also in this group, she
can find more friends and become more social.
Physical development: Participant was very well-developed in physical aspects. I would
recommend parents to push her to play more sports. She liked to play basketball and as I mentioned
before she was very good at dancing.
Philosophical development: As participant developed very good in philosophical aspects,
I would recommend some leadership activities for her because she was a very good problem-solver
so she can improve her philosophical skills in the future and also it helps her to improve her social
and emotional skills.
Intellectual development: Participant cognitive and intellectual skills developed very well.
She is very smart and as I mentioned before she was able to talk in both Persian and English
language in just one year. The only thing that could damage her learning skills was her social
problem and the lack of confidence. So, in this case, my recommendations for her parents is
encouraging and giving her more opportunity to find her talents. Also, parents can ask teachers
and school to provide her some opportunity to improve her skills.
In the end, because these are formative years for children’s development of self-concept
and self-esteem, it is important for teachers to create environments in which all children will thrive
and develop a positive self-image (Copple, 2009, P.270). So I would definitely recommend parents
to have strong communication with the teacher and talk about her social and emotional problems.
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References
Bredekamp, A. (2017). Effective Practice in Early Childhood Education. Boston: Pearson
Learning Solution.
Bredekamp, S., & Copple, C. (2009). Developmentally Appropriate Practice in Early Childhood Program.
Washington D.C: NAEYC books.
Ellsworth, J. (1998). ESE 504. Retrieved from
[Link]
Fu, Y., & Burns, R. (2018). Demographic Characteristics Related to Motor Skills in Children Aged
5-7 Years Old. International Journal of Kinesiology and Sports Science, 6(2), 18. Retrieved
from [Link]
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McCown, R., & Snowman. J. (2015). Psychology Applied to Teaching. Stamford: Cengage
Learning.
