1. Shared Attention/Regulation, Interest in the World

The child’s ability to regulate his or her attention and behavior while being interested in the full range of sensations (sights, sounds, smells, their own movement patterns, etc.). The child’s ability to enter into a state of shared attention with another person. This is a child’s ability to process their environment, filter out distractions, and engage with others, attend to play or tasks (pay attention in the classroom). Top: The child is calm, organized and able to attend and interact. Bottom: The child is self-absorbed, engages in self stimulating behavior (possibly anxious), and/or unable to interact with others.

2. Engagement/Forming Relationships

The child’s ability to engage in relationships, including the depth and range of his pleasure and warmth, the related feelings, such as assertiveness or sadness, that can be incorporated into the quality of engagement and the stability of the child’s engagement (does he withdraw or become aimless when under stress). Top: The child is able to engage with others through a range of emotions and activities (does not disengage when upset). The child displays a range of affect including “The GLEAM IN THE EYE!” Bottom: The child has difficulty engaging with others, is self-absorbed or fixated on “things” (plays with objects rather than people), is easily distressed and/or displays flat affect.

3. Two-Way, Purposeful Interactions with Gestures/Intentional Two-Way Communication

The child’s ability to enter into two-way purposeful communication. At it’s most basic level, this involves helping a child open and close circles of communication. This is a child’s ability to be intentional in interactions and activities (e.g., a child is able to initiate with another person to keep activities going, for desired objects or activities, etc.). Top: The child is intentional, purposeful and persistent and can use gestures to convey intent. Bottom: The child has no ability to be intentional with others except to maybe whine or grab for basic needs.

4. Two-Way, Purposeful Problem-Solving Interactions/Development of Complex Sense of Self

The ability to string together many circles of communication/Problem solving into a larger pattern (ten or twenty). This is necessary for negotiating many of the most important emotional needs in life (being close to others, exploring and being assertive, limiting aggression, negotiation, safety, etc.) This is the stage where the child begins develop a sense of self/Self esteem/Independence (“I did it!” or “Look what I did!” using affect, gestures and words if verbal) Top: The child can sustain interactions for longer periods of time, uses motor planning to solve problems, is persistent in interactions and displays a strong sense of self. Bottom: The child has no ability to sustain interactions for longer periods of time or when faced with challenges.

5. Elaborating Ideas/Representational Capacity and Elaboration of Symbolic Thinking

The child’s ability to create mental representations. The ability to do pretend play or use words, phrases or sentences to convey some emotional intention (“What is that?,” ”Look at this fish!,” or “I’m angry!” etc.). The child begins to have their own ideas and share them with the people around them. This is the ability to share ideas with others and represent ideas and real life through play or activities. Top: The child begins to use language to express ideas, can have original ideas (not scripted), share them with others, elaborate on his/her ideas, connect emotions to their ideas and replicate real life through play and work. Bottom: The child has no ability to have original ideas or express their ideas, is often scripted or stressed when encouraged to “think,” has little understanding of emotions and/or the world around him/her.

6. Building Bridges Between Ideas/Emotional Thinking 

The child’s ability to make connections between different internal representations or emotional ideas (“I’m mad because you’re mean.”). This capacity is a foundation for higher level thinking, problem-solving and such capacities as separating fantasy from reality, modulating impulses and mood, and learning to concentrate and plan. Top: The child can connect ideas logically, answer “why” questions and understand the underlying meaning behind ideas, give reasons behind their emotions, and display higher-level thinking abilites. Bottom: The child can have ideas, but cannot connect them logically or give reasons behind them.

These three levels below are for grade school children only:

7. Multi-Cause, Comparative, and Triangular Thinking

The child is able to explore multiple reasons for a feeling, comparing feelings, and understanding triadic interactions among feeling states (“I feel left out when Susie likes Janet better than me.”) Finding an indirect road to problem solve. Example: John wants to be Sarah’s friend. He sees that Tom is Sarah’s friend, so John becomes Tom’s friend. This type of thinking is more expansive and even a little manipulative. He learns to “work the crowd” to satisfy his social needs. During this stage the child becomes more interested in his body and sexual relations. These feelings may cause the child to be fearful. Nurture him through his fears and help him to understand his feelings. It is a good sign when a child becomes manipulative in a triangular way. Understanding the three person system the child becomes interested in all facets of their world: sex, death, where did I come from?, etc. Some children experience fear and anxiety dealing with this. This is common in all pre-adolescents. Work on the fears and nurture them giving them structure while they are going through this.

8. Emotionally Differentiated Gray-Area Thinking 

Shades and gradations among differentiated feeling states (Ability to describe degrees of feelings about anger, love, excitement, disappointment-“I feel a little annoyed”) The child begins to know where they fall on the social ladder. He begins to define himself by how accepted he is by his peer group. He begins to see the “shades of gray” and become better problem solvers. He can also see consequences of their behavior. The child is able to give you a range of emotions. For example, “I’m a little mad, very mad, etc.” or “I’m the best, Jo is the second best, and John is the worst.”

9. Intermittent Reflective Thinking, a Stable Sense of Self, and an Internal Standard

Reflecting on feelings in a relationship to an internalized sense of self (“It’s not like me to feel so angry” or “I shouldn’t feel this jealous”) The child begins to internalize values and develops a greater sense of self that can’t be broken down by lack of acceptance by peer group. Example: Sally was mean to me because she was having a bad day, but I’m still a good person.