Motor Development means the development of body movements and various Motor abilities from birth till death. In fact, it is a progressive change in movement throughout the life cycle.
There are three stages of motor development:
- Infancy hood development
- Early childhood development
- Later childhood development
Motor development is of two types:
- Gross motor development involves the development of large muscles in the child‘s body such as sitting, walking, running etc.
- Fine motor development involves the development of small muscles of the body, especially during the small movements of the fingers and hands eg. Holding of the javelin, discus and pole, catching a cricket ball etc.
Factors affecting motor development :
- Environment: - Encouragement, love and security help the child to take the risk to explore fearlessly and to know more about the environment which leads to a better sensory development.
- Immunization: - If mother and child both are immunized at a proper time it leads to good sensory motor development.
- Nutrition: - Nutritious food promotes good motor development. Sensory-motor development is dependent upon nutrition that the child gets to a great extent. Children get stronger and development is good if they get nutritious food.
