Q2: What are the benefits of observing a child in her natural environment?

<Patricia Maris>

Observing children in their natural environment playing with a peer or with materials reveals important skills and interests. Some standardized tool items allow for observation to be used for scoring. This allows for less interruption of the flow of the child in demonstrating his or her skills. The child is naturally comfortable in this setting and we could observe all developmental domains during a brief period of time. Observing a child building with blocks with a parent or with another child gives us information about motor skills in terms of how the child is using his or her hands and how he or she is maintaining their body in a sitting position or while moving around the play area. We learn about intricate details of cognition and language if we hear an imaginative play scheme associated with the block play or perhaps it is single words or no language at all. We see how responsive the child is to the language of others. We learn about social emotional strengths or areas of need as we observe joint attention with a peer/caregiver or we may observe incidents of turn taking. We learn about frustration tolerance and attention capacities as the child contends with blocks that may collapse or just not work out as intended.