Development of psychomotor skills and the construction of the body scheme

The psychomotor skills are understood as the integration of the cognitive, emotional, symbolic and sensorimotor skills applied in a psychomotor context. This context is related with self-control of our psychomotor capacities as well as the motion and strength of our body. The maturation process is linked with the environment. For instance, two kids from the same age may not have the same psychomotor abilities due to the characteristics of their culture and the interaction they have. Nevertheless, in some cases there could be differences in the psychomotor development of two kids from the same culture. In this case the variances are due to genetic inheritance and stimulation that the child receives in order to develop skills. 

Although the individual and cultural context has an impact on the development of the psychomotor skills, there are few aspects which depend on our genetic and biology so every one of us go through this process at some point or another of their life as it is part of our nature. We are talking about the cephalocaudal law and the proximodistal law which are clearly explained and exemplified in the table underneath. 

The ontogenetic changes are five stages that involve the first three years of life for which every child goes through because it is also part of the human being, but the development and achievement of each stage is different in every kid because of the culture and specific needs of the individual.

This video explains the development the psychomotor skills of a child which bears out the information in the table below and also goes into more details. It is easier to understand the theory with this video as we can observe how the child’s skills are evolving in time. 

In order to have a proper development of our psychomotor skills we must construct our body scheme. Its image it is described as a conscious perception of our body in a global and segmentary approach. The process of construction of the body scheme is developed by the information we receive of our body from the interactions between our body and the context. The image we have about our body is constructed by three main aspects:

The first boy image we develop is the perceptual image which is close related with a representation of about body provided by the size and shape of our body. In this way, we have a subjective image about our body but this conception is near to the reality. Once we achieve the perceptual image we develop a cognitive image based on the beliefs and thoughts that we have about our own body. The cognitive image is constructed by self-messages we send to ourselves accord to how we see and consider our body. Those messages answer the question of what do we think about our body. The next and final step to have a proper body image is the emotional image which gathers the information provided by ourselves in the first two images but applied in the emotional field. That means that in this emotional image we develop a level of satisfaction or displease with our shape and size based on the experiences we have had during the first years of our life. When we have the capacity to observe our body from its parts and not just as a whole we can have a positive image about our body but we can be resigned about a specific part of our body because we do not like its shape or because they do not have the utility we want to give them. For example, a girl can be satisfied with her body in a global perspective but can hate her fingers because are too short to play properly the piano and she does not like how rings look on her fingers.  

Therefore, we construct an image about our body since we are in a very young age because when we are still a baby we have an earlier contact with our body than with the environment as we are not able to move so we cannot explore the context. We only know what we are able to see an in the first months of our live we can only observe ourselves. Then, this scheme is developed during childhood firstly by looking at our body in a global way and later by exploring it from the parts that involve the body. Once we have a complete image of our body we develop its identity which means that we start being conscious about our capabilities according to the shape, movement and coordination of our body. When we integrate this corporal self it increases our level of autonomy as we know our abilities and limits, and we can plan what we want to do. This anticipation can be explained in the school context when a child intends to reach a book form a shelf which is taller than him. When he is younger than seven years old he knows that the shelf is in a higher position than him but he tries to grab it anyway. However, when this same child is a older he is aware of his height and the length of his arm and legs so he knows if he has a chance to reach the book on his own because of the proportions of his body or he needs an external help such as the teacher or a stair to take the book. This awareness should be fully developed during preadolescence (11-12 years old).