Development of the Brain
Last weekend my sister that lives in New Heaven, CT and I spent over two hours on Skype. We talked about different things as usual. One of the topics that cased me to think over night was that of child development. The reason the subject is of interest to me is the fact that I have four grand children, two granddaughters from my oldest son that is at the time divorced and two grandsons from my youngest who earlier this year moved to a small town (about 1,300 people) in Indiana.
The public education system in the USA is not working and has not been working for a long period of time. The reason for this simple and bold statement is based not on opinion but on facts. By testing graduates from our school systems against the ones of other countries we are ranked not in the top three but fifteenth. I always asked if the reader is able to list fourteen developed countries in the world. Who knows, in a few more years we will probably be ranked in the twenties unless there are some dramatic changes in our education system. That is one aspect of the problem that I am not going to delve further at this time.
The other which perhaps is more important that our school system is the development of the brain. Allow me to define the difference. When a student attends school, he or she is supposed to learn some specific set of subjects / skills that in theory will be of direct use in their life and careers. For example, if the student is learning to become a physician, then being able to describe the operation of most (if not all) the organs in the human body would be quite desirable. On the other hand such skill would be in most cases quite useless if the student is preparing to become a civil engineer.
I can feel already liberals jumping because of the previous paragraph. Please hold your horses and keep on reading. You might not be in total disagreement when you are done reading the rest of the blog.
As a child one needs to be exposed to some set of basic disciplines which will not be sufficient on their own to make a living as an adult, but will enable your brain to develop making it easier to acquire some set of specialized knowledge and skill which will in turn allow you to become proficient in any field down the line.
Following is a short and simple list of skills that children at a very small age (between 2 and 4 years) should start acquiring, developing and hopefully retaining to be applied in further brain development:
- Discipline
- Languages
- Music
- Mathematics
- Science
- Sports
Discipline is something that has been disappearing in our country since the 1950’s. It all started with the flower power era. Discipline is important to help individuals pursue goals from inception to completion. Stop reasoning with your toddler and put pressure to have them complete satisfactorily more and more challenging tasks. Remember what Einstein said: “One percent of inspiration and 99 percent of perspiration”.
The ability to speak multiple languages is something not pursued by most parents. Some children motivated by their parents or curiosity try a language or two while in the K-12 educational system. Not many are able to speak and write any of those languages fluently.
The ability of playing one or more instruments is something that Naive Americans do not seem to appreciate. In general is the child does not show a predisposition the subject is completely ignored by parents. Kids that are in band are not the most popular in their class. Our society tends to promote kids to play sports in order to live through them the frustrations and failures of the parents (“I scored five touch downs on the homecoming game but today I hate my job and my life”) or in the case the child has exceptional ability, the possibility of becoming a professional player. There are not too many openings at that level so do not hold your breath on such high compensation yet short careers.
When a child likes mathematics in school our society immediately puts them in the “geek group”. Apparently kids like to be “jocks” instead of “geeks”. As time goes by and the young adults attend college and pursue advanced degrees then “geeks” appear to become quite popular. I am not promoting that all kids become mathematicians. Mathematics are just simply good for brain development.
Finding out how things work helps the brain develop. It also generates interest in learning about other fields that might be of more interest. In our current K-12 educational system emphasis on science is almost nil. Parents need to motivate their children to learn about science by providing books and other materials to develop interest to learn about how the world works.
Last but not least we have sports. Lately there has been a lot of research regarding physical conditioning not just for muscles but also for the brain. The brain appears to work better when properly oxygenated. Obese kids that are tired to do sports tend to sit in front of the TV and play games or just watch standard programs. With very few exceptions the commercials and programs on TV are not geared to brain development.
One must take all these suggestions with a grain of salt. I guess most individual base their opinions on their experience. I am not a brain surgeon but as I was growing up my parents promoted most of the items in the list. As an adult I still try to learn and practice items from the list. If you have young children perhaps you might look into the activities listed in this blog and see if with time your child starts to develop a better and more powerful brain which will help him or her to achieve higher goals in life. For more information on alternate educational approaches take a look at what the top ranked countries in education are doing. The USA is ranked fifteenth!
