Growth Flashcards
What is growth?
It is an increase in physical size and mass.
What happens to babies’ bones whilst they’re growing?
When babies are born, their bones are made of cartilage.
Bone growth occurs in the growth plates at the end of the bones.
Growth plates are disc shaped pieces of cartilage.
As the cartilage matures, osteoblasts develop. They help produce new bones that will get longer and stronger.
What the principles of growth
As babies grow, they start to develop balance/coordination and they also gain control of their muscles.
Growth spurts are not continuous.
Body parts grow at different rates.
Growth rate can vary between boys and girls or children of the same age.
How do you measure growth?
You weigh the baby on a baby scale.
You measure their length/height on a length board (up to 2years).
You measure their head circumference with a soft tape measure.
How do you record growth?
They use a gentile chart to record growth of babies.
This can help them to identify signs of illnesses or problems within development.
This is recorded out of 100 to work out their percentile number.
