North Carolina Early Learning and Development Progressions: Birth to Five

Domain: NC Foundations for Early Learning: Emotional and Social Development (ESD)

Subdomain: Developing a Sense of Self

Goal: Children demonstrate a positive sense of self-identify and self-awareness.

Skill Progression: Awareness of self through actions

Age: 24-27 Months

Click here to go to all skills for ages 24-27 Months.

Experiments with putting things together and taking them apart

Situations for Observation of Skill

Observe the child with blocks, puzzles, nesting cups or dolls, etc.

Elicitation Strategy

Take apart the items presented and watch to see what the child does.

Behavior Observed

The child will be challenged to see if she can reconstruct or make something new with the materials. This demonstrates the child’s self-motivation and goal orientation.

Routines-based Intervention (Embedded Instruction)

Encourage early childhood educators and parents to provide simple ways for children to experiment with fitting things together (stacking bowls and lids, pots and pans, boxes of different sizes, etc.) Puzzles and commercial toys are also good for observing this behavior.

 North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, 2015

©2015 by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/.