Principle 1: Skills self-organize and increase in complexity over time.
Skills can be intentionally developed with positive social relationships, rich learning environments, and well-designed learning experiences.
Note: Unconstrained Kids unpacks, translates, and integrates academic research and data about constrained and unconstrained skills for people that run, fund, and assist organizations that teach and serve kids. This post is part of a series that describes 14 key principles of skill building I identified from the Science of Learning and Development. (Especially Dynamic Skill Theory.) Like everything on this Substack, this post is a work-in-progress. I will make updates as needed. Citations are included at the end. Questions, comments, and suggestions are welcome.
Last updated: June 4, 2025
Key Takeaway
Skill is the ability to think and act in an organized way in a specific context (Immordino-Yang and Fischer, 2010). Skills can be intentionally developed with positive social relationships, rich learning environments, and well-designed learning experiences. Children have different starting points and follow different developmental pathways. (See Principle 12.) Nonetheless, they have similar capacity to develop basic and complex skills under the right conditions (Cantor et al., 2019).
“Skills are self-organizing. Part of the natural functioning of skills is that they organize and reorganize themselves. These self-organizing properties go beyond maintenance to include growth of new, more complex skills.” (Fischer & Bidell, 2006)
One of the many remarkable features of the human brain is its capacity for self-organization. In response to stimuli and experiences, the brain’s internal processes organize its functioning and development. The brain reorganizes itself multiple times between when a child is born and when she graduates high school.1 This reorganization supports progressively complex skill development (Fischer 2008; Fischer 2009).
Skills mirror this ability. Skills developed for specific purposes combine with other skills developed for other purposes to create new, integrated skills. In this way, simple skills self-organize into more complex skills that can be used to support an increasingly wider range of activities.
For example, the ability to count objects is a skill we develop in early childhood. This basic skill, which starts with concrete objects, becomes more complex when it’s applied to abstract representations of numbers (numerals). This ability eventually supports even more complex skills such as adding numbers together.
Addition later supports multiplication (which is really multiple addition). Addition and multiplication in turn support even more complex (and abstract) skills such as word problem solving and algebraic thinking. These skills support even more advanced math skills such as probability and calculus.
Developmentally and interpersonally rich experiences are the breeding grounds for skills. For example, consider the skills that help us manage our thoughts, emotions, and actions: attention control, attention shifting, inhibition control, and working memory (Dawson & Guare 2018; Cantor et al., 2019). Stable, responsive relationships and supportive learning environments support the development and integration of these “executive skills,” which in turn support the development of other skills (Stafford-Brizard, 2016).
“By stimulating the brain’s self-organizing and reorganizing properties and integrating subsystems of skills, this feedback loop gives rise to the capacity to self-regulate and, ultimately, gives meaning to experiences, including stressful experiences.” (Cantor et al., 2019)
But wait, there’s more
Works Cited
Barrett, L. F. (2020). Seven and a half lessons about the brain. Houghton Mifflin.
Cantor, P., Osher, D., Berg, J., Steyer, L., & Rose, T. (2019). Malleability, plasticity, and individuality: How children learn and develop in context. Applied Developmental Science, 23(4), 307–337.
Dawson, P., & Guare, R. (2018). Executive skills in children and adolescents: A practical guide to assessment and intervention. The Guilford Press.
Fischer, K. W. (2008). Dynamic cycles of cognitive and brain development: Measuring growth in mind, brain, and education. In A. M. Battro, K. W. Fischer, & P. Léna (Eds.), The educated brain (pp. 127–150). Cambridge University Press.
Fischer, K. W. (2009). Mind, brain, and education: Building a scientific groundwork for learning and teaching. Mind, Brain, and Education, 3(1), 3–16.
Fischer, K. W., & Bidell, T. R. (2006). Dynamic development of action and thought. In R. M. Lerner & W. Damon (Eds.), Handbook of child psychology: Theoretical models of human development (6th ed., pp. 313–399). John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Immordino-Yang, M. H., & Fischer, K. W. (2010). Neuroscience bases of learning. In V. G. Aukrust (Ed.), International encyclopedia of education (3rd Edition, pp. 310–316). Elsevier.
Stafford-Brizard, K. B. (2016). Building blocks for learning: A framework for comprehensive student development. Turnaround for Children.
For an excellent overview of the human brain, see Lisa Feldman Barrett’s Seven and a half lessons about the brain.