Children in a doorway in Jerusalem

Children in Namibia

A child (plural: children) is a boy or girl who has not reached puberty, but also refers to offspring of any age. Adults remain the children of their parents, no matter what their age. The term is also used figuratively, for someone who behaves like a child. It can be applied to non-human offspring, as in the child node of a tree.

Legal definition of child

The legal definition of "child" is interchangeable with minor and may vary by country, in keeping with cultural conceptions.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child defines a child as "every human being below the age of 18 years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier". ^[1]

In a New York court ruling in 2006 on the eviction of a pregnant woman, the court declared that her child was equally protected under the law although the eviction notice was served before the child was born.^[2]

Child development

Child development is the study of the processes and mechanisms that accompany the physical and mental development of an infant as it matures.

Pediatrics is the branch of medicine relating to the care of children from infancy through adolescence, and sometimes even young adults (ages 0–21 years).

These age ranges are approximate, and may differ from culture to culture. The following list reflects the concept of child development in the 21st century.

• Zygote, the point of Conception, fertilization.
• Embryo; in the later stages also called fetus.
• Neonate (newborn) in the first month outside of the womb.
• Infant (baby) (ages 0–1.5).
• Toddler (ages 1.5–4).
• Middle childhood - Primary school/Elementary school age (ages 5–10).
• Prepubescence, a subset of the above (ages 10–11, approximately).
• Preadolescence (preteen, or middle school age) (ages 11–13, approximately). Note overlap with prepubesent stage of middle childhood.
• Adolescence and puberty (teenager) (13–19).

Famous child prodigies

Main article: Child prodigy

• Christian Friedrich Heinecken (The Infant of Lübeck)
• Isaac Albéniz
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
• Sarah Chang
• Yo-Yo Ma

Unaccompanied minor

Some airlines provide special services to a passenger who is an Unaccompanied Minor (UM). These may be compulsory paid services.

There may be special rules for asylum-seeking unaccompanied minors.

See also

References

External links

Find more information on Child by searching Wikipedia's sister projects
	Dictionary definitions from Wiktionary
	Textbooks from Wikibooks
	Quotations from Wikiquote
	Source texts from Wikisource
	Images and media from Commons
	News stories from Wikinews
	Learning resources from Wikiversity

• CDC's "Learn the Signs. Act Early.” campaign - Information for parents on early childhood development and developmental disabilities
• Historical children photos