It was fascinating to use Erikson's fourth stage as I observed Oak and other kindergarten children because it covered everything within the classroom, the interactions between parents and children and the importance of trust and gaining confidence. I really wish the school year hadn't ended, as I would have loved to use the Erikson stages for an entire school year to see exactly how kids transition from one stage to the next. Often, our society thinks that children should develop based on grade levels, but in reality they must master one skill before they can move on to the next, and everyone takes a different amount of time to do so. Erikson's fourth stage was really about me since I am a kindergarten teacher, and the biggest lesson learned from this observation was how important trust is to a child and how a child needs to have a strong foundation of trust to learn and grow. “Life is meaningless without interdependence. We need each other, and the sooner we learn that, the better for all of us” (Erikson, 1980). I firmly believe in this quote from Erikson because as a teacher I see how important it is for peer interactions to learn and grow, and the same goes for parents. We must all work together to create a positive learning environment; but we can't do that if a link is missing in the environment