Your Five-Year-Old

Typical Behaviors of Five-Year-Olds

The five-year-old thoroughly enjoys life and is sunny and serene. The child at this stage is often anxious to please and determined to do everything just right. While not particularly adventurous, the five-year old is expansive intellectually and enjoys practicing skills and abilities.

Motor Behaviors

• Is more poised and may exhibit less exuberance that at four and a half
• Is more organized and has greater control of movements
• Has well-developed gross motor skills; enjoys skipping, jumping, and climbing
• Has established hand dominance and uses dominant hand more consistently
• Has increased control over pencil grasp

Language Behaviors

• Experiences an explosion in language learning
• Enjoys talking but may answer using one word responses
• Shows much interest in new and big words
• Knows that words represent ideas and objects; likes to discuss this
• Asks questions now to seek information
• Speaks with increasing grammatical accuracy
• Pronounces more clearly

Personal- Social Behaviors

• Wants to please and do things right
• Wants to have things go smoothly and is a much easier playmate
• Is more independent in personal care skills
• Often enjoys one-on-one activities

Learning Behaviors

• Has more of an understanding of the world and may accurately judge what he or she can and cannot do
• Asks how, when, what and, especially why questions constantly
• Lives in the moment
• Needs adult approval; wants to do the “right thing”
• Relates imaginative play to real life
• Exhibits increasingly creative and constructive abilities; enjoys hands-on learning

Typical Behaviors of Five-and-a-Half-Year-Olds

The five-and-a-half-year-old is often hesitant, dawdling, and indecisive. Behavior at this stage may be characterized by opposite extremes such as happy/sad, quiet/loud, or agreeable/defiant. The five-and-a-half-year-old may seem to be in a constant state of tension.

Motor Behaviors

• Is more restless and less composed; finds sitting still increasingly difficult
• May have an awkward pencil grasp
• Frequently reverses letters and numbers when writing Language Behaviors
• Has difficulty making decisions
• Uses more diverse and complex language
• Offers or asks for explanations

Personal-Social Behaviors

• Is oppositional in nature, moving from one emotional extreme to the opposite
• Disobeys readily; can be brash or combative
• May show an increase in tensional outlets such as nail biting, hair pulling, or crying
• Is insecure and tentative in nature
• Complains readily
• Plays well one moment, argues the next
• Is torn between choices, often tries to choose both options at once in play and other activities

Learning Behaviors

• Tends to exhibit oppositional behavior in play activities
• Has difficulty making decisions
• Has frequent reversals of letters/numbers
• Is prone to tattle on others due to an emerging sense of right and wrong