How Does Our Body Grow?
All living things grow. They grow in size, shape and how they are made we call it growth of structure, also as regards functions as to what they can do. The important things that help growth lie inside every living being from the beginning. These forces use name as its heredity. The animals including human beings have the stages of growth. These are embryo and fetus – not yet born, infant, child, youth, nature adult, and old age.
There are creatures with hardly an infancy. The birds can fly soon after hatching. After, about three days of birth, the guinea pig can take care of itself. The human being is not an adult until he is about 20 years old. An infant at birth has all the nerve cells – the cells in brain, in the spinal cord and those that reach out into every part of body. The growth of connections between these nerve cells will enable one to control his movements, to learn, and to behave like the people in his society.
All human beings are much alike in growth. There are important differences as well. Boys and girls all follow the same general pathway of growth. Each one follows it in his own particular way and at individual speed. The growth during early weeks is faster after birth, then at any other time. Even before the end of the first year, they are growing less rapidly. Through the whole period of childhood, they grow at a moderate rate. Then growth starts to speed up again.
In case of girls, this usually starts between the age of 11 and 13; for boys between 12 and 14. The growth is faster until they reach a top speed. Later, the growth slows down and more slowly until growth in height stops altogether, having reached full size. Growth in weight and height often takes turn in a person. First the growth is upward for a while, then sideways. For many people there is a “chubby” period that happens around 11 or 12 years. Later their height begins to catch up in the next years and with this the chubbiness is gone.