This is one phenomenon (if phenomenon is the right words for it) that parents seldom know about: PRECOCIOUS PUBERTY.
What exactly is precocious puberty? The word precocious means developing unusually early. What does this mean? Puberty is normally a stage in a child’s life that happens between 8-16 in girls and 9-14 in boys. When they reach the stage of puberty, they experience a lot of bodily changes. Or in other words, this is the stage when these children become sexually mature.
What are the different changes that happen at this stage? For females, the first sign of puberty is breast development. Acne, hair growth and menstruation follow suit in no particular order. In males, their genitalia become bigger, along with hair growth, facial hair, development of muscles, acne and deepening of the voice. A rapid increase in height also happens at this stage.
How exactly is precocious different from a “normal” puberty stage? For one, if the signs or physical development happen to children before they reach age seven or eight for girls and age nine for boys, chances are they have this condition. This more often happens to girls than to boys. There usually are underlying conditions that affect precocious puberty: infection, hormone disorder, injuries, brain abnormalities, etc.
Why did I write a post about this? I remember a student of mine who had this condition. If my memory serves me right, she was given injections every month to suppress her oncoming menstrual process. When her bones were tested for its “age” it was found out that her bones are older than her actual chronological age. Her weight was and still is, unusually heavy. They later found out that she had a hormonal problem which later on led to her precocious puberty which also had an effect on her capacity to learn.
Click here and here to read about an expert explanation of this condition.
This entry was posted on Monday, August 13th, 2007 at 9:31 pm and is filed under Being a (Special Ed) Teacher, Health, Interesting tidbits, special education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.