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- The
outside world shapes the brain's wiring
- The
outside world is experienced through the senses: seeing,
hearing, smelling, touching, and tasting; enabling the brain
to create or modify connections
- The
brain operates on a "use it or lose it" principle
- Relationships
with other people early in life are the major source of
development of the emotional and social parts of the brain
Why should parents
and caregivers know about brain development?
The brain is the
part of the body that allows us to feel joy or despair, to
respond to others in a loving or angry way, to use reason
of simply to react. These capacities don't just magically
appear - they result from the interplay between a child's
heredity and the experiences he or she has during childhood.
At birth, the brain
is remarkably unfinished. The parts of the brain that handle
thinking and remembering, as well as emotional and social
behaviour, are very underdeveloped. The fact that the brain
matures in the world, rather than in the womb, means that
young children are deeply affected by their experiences. Their
relationships with parents and other important caregivers,
the sights, sounds, smells and feelings they experience, the
challenges they meet, don't just influence their moods. These
experiences actually affect the way children's brains become
"wired".
Adapted from: The First Years Last Forever
published by the Canadian Institute of Child Health
For more information on Brain development and the importance of early childhood education visit Ontario Early Years
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