Developmentally+Appropriate+Principles

** 1. Domains of development are closely related; development in one domain influences other domains. ** 8. Development and learning result from interaction of biological maturation and the environment, which includes both the physical and social worlds that children live in. ** 9. Play is an important vehicle for children's social, emotional, and cognitive development, as well as a reflection of their development. ** 12. Children develop and learn best in the context of a community where they are safe and valued, their physical needs are met, and they feel psychologically secure. **
 * __12 Principles that Inform Developmentally Appropriate Practices__
 * 2. Development occurs in a relatively orderly sequence, building on those skills already acquired. **
 * 3. Development precedes at varying rates from child to child, and may be uneven within areas of each child's development. **
 * 4. Early experiences have both cumulative and delayed effects on individual children's development; optimal periods exist for certain types of development and learning. **
 * 5. Development proceeds in predictable directions toward greater complexity, organization, and internalization. **
 * 6. Development and learning occur in and are influenced by multiple social and cultural contexts. **
 * 7. Children are active learners, drawing on direct physical and social experience as well as culturally transmitted knowledge to construct their own understandings of the world around them. **
 * 10. Development advances when children have opportunities to practice newly acquired skills as well as when they experience a challenge just beyond the level of their present mastery. **
 * 11. Children demonstrate different modes of knowing and learning and different ways of representing what they know. **