North Carolina Early Learning and Development Progressions: Birth to Five

Domain: NC Foundations for Early Learning: Health and Physical Development (HPD)

Subdomain: Self-Care

Goal: Children develop independence in caring for themselves and their environment.

Skill Progression: Toileting

Age: 12-15 Months

Click here to go to all skills for ages 12-15 Months.

Uses facial expressions, squatting to indicate need to eliminate

Situations for Observation of Skill

Observe the child during daily routines or interview the adult.

Elicitation Strategy

If there is no opportunity to observe the infant when defecation is taking place, ask the parent if the child shows behaviors that indicate when she is eliminating.

Behavior Observed

The child is willing to sit in the potty chair as long as the adult is present, but does not yet associate it with toileting.

Routines-based Intervention (Embedded Instruction)

Encourage parents to use a potty chair, so the child’s feet reach the floor. This is more stabilizing for the child than sitting with feet dangling on a toilet training potty seat on a standard toilet. The use of the potty chair with no expectations allows the child to view the potty-chair as a comfortable, non-threatening place.

 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/.