Once a young adult hits a certain age, several things kick into action. Not only is puberty raging, the brain is going through some amazing changes, too. The thought that the brain was finished developing in the early years is evolving as new studies are finding the teenage brain goes through one last push to keep the brain in tip-top condition, or lose certain functions forever.
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The mind is an amazing thing and doesn’t seem to ever get a rest – even during sleep. The body gets recharged during those dark and quiet hours of the night, but young minds could use a bit of focus and concentration to help improve memory and understanding. That is where meditation comes in. And, meditation is not just for Buddhist monks and health gurus. It is starting to be recognized as a way to improve brain function and the young developing mind.Meditation has been around for quite some time, with the first references as far back as 5000 years ago. Buddhists and Hindus are considered the original groups that tapped into the power of meditation and helped spread its popularity across cultures and continents. Many think of chanting, swaying, and odd behaviors when imagining meditating, but do not understand that even sitting quietly for a short amount of time helps focus the mind and encourage memory. Even the Beatles spent some time with the holistic healing concepts of meditation, helping to bring the idea of meditation into the mainstream of modern America.
Research has proven that meditation aids the brain in multiple ways. Not only does meditation promote self-discipline and inner awareness, it also affects the brain. The University of Wisconsin discovered mental experiences achieved during meditation creates brain activity in the left-prefrontal cortex, creating inner coordination and concentration in the brain. The prefrontal cortex takes information from all the five senses to help make decisions and create strong memories. Through meditation, the brain builds better memory, understanding and comprehension. And, just like playing golf or practicing the piano, you get better the more you do it.
A recent study found meditation encouraged blood flow to the brain, improving memory in adults with specific memory problems. Participants spent 12 minutes daily for eight weeks practicing Kirtan Kriya meditation, a form of meditation that involves sitting and chanting. Results found participants had improved memory abilities and that mild memory problems were deterred from progressing to a more severe state. And it is not just older folks benefiting from meditation.
The active child benefits from meditating to calm the mind so it can focus and build memory. Schools are getting involved in using meditation for better success in the classroom and resolving conflict. Private schools, such as Yoga Works in Laguna Beach, California, offer classes to youngsters on how to meditate positively and use meditation to assist with stress relief and thrive in academics. According to ParentingOC, studies published in the Journal of Applied School Psychology find meditating beneficial to students as young as first grade. Meditation before school or at the end of the day helps the child focus and concentrate on concepts and situations he may be working through or wanting to remember. Being taught meditation concepts early in life offer the child the ability to have a life-long skill to build brain function and retention.
Not only does meditation encourage memory function and healthy brain function, but also traditional meditation concepts encourage mindfulness. Children in inner-city schools in Oakland are starting their days with the striking of a Tibetan singing bowl to encourage mindful awareness. During an eight-week classroom experiment, children were led through meditation practices to induce inner-awareness, kindness, and thoughtfulness. Kids were less stressed and more open minded when dealing with frustrating situations. The children found they had knowledge of how to solve problems within themselves, leading to better self-esteem and understanding of others.
Whether in the classroom or at home, a meditation routine can easily be started that will encourage learning, relaxation, focus and clarity. Children as young as three can practice meditation, but expect sessions to last only a couple of minutes. Finding a quiet spot is the first step and set a schedule so that the child knows when meditation time takes place. Once everyone is ready, try:
-Ringing bell meditation: Have the child sit in a crossed-leg position with his eyes closed. Ask the child to focus on using his sense of hearing to listen for a bell and the whole sound it creates. Then, gently ring a bell and, once the sound of the bell has finished, invite the child to open his eyes and discuss the sound the bell made, encouraging active listening. After practicing listening to the bell for several meditation sessions, lead the child through active listening for sounds he hears around him while sitting in silence.
-Breathing to the beat: Deep breathing helps relax the body and circulate blood and energy throughout the body. Select music that is calm and has a slow regular beat and invite the child to sit in a crossed-leg position with his eyes closed. Now, invite him to slowly breathe deeply to the beat while concentrating on the movements his body makes while inhaling and exhaling. Once the song is over, discuss with the child how his body feels. He can use the technique to calm or focus his body without the music by closing his eyes and counting five deep breaths in a quiet corner.
-Directed imagination: Use directed discussion to help lead the child through imagining working through issues or situations – or for general relaxation. Invite the child to find a comfortable spot sitting with his eyes closed. After he has taken a minute to breathe deeply and relax, guide him through directed imagination by asking him to imagine walking on the beach or sitting in the sun. Then, once the child is calm, he can be led through imagining dealing with challenging situations, like memorizing skills for an upcoming test or dealing with a bully at school.
Meditation not only builds the brain and aids in relaxation, but also encourages the young child’s imagination and development. Spending time focusing on meditation is an opportunity to help a child learn to focus and build memory skills as well as to enjoy some quality time together.
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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Kids are active, some more than others. And, occasionally, those active kids are labeled as difficult students or challenged learners. This is not always the case. Those wiggly kids might need a bit more attention due to being kinesthetic learners, or children that best understand new information when learned in a physical way or by working things out tactilely. Kinetic learners are also considered tactile learners, which means the act of touching and using the hands and body is additionally beneficial to learning.There are three different types of learning – visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. Visual learners learn through visual activities, auditory best through listening, and kinesthetic through movement and activity. Characteristics of a kinesthetic learner include enjoying participating in sports and physical activities, having good coordination skills, using hands to gesture often, and enjoying spending time outdoors. These are wonderful characteristics for a child along with a motivating force to continually participate in physical activities with your child. But, along with having positive attributes, being a kinesthetic learner also has some aspects that can be demanding.
Kinesthetic learners are often easily distracted by others, have difficulty sitting or staying in one place long, and find moving while learning to be beneficial and even necessary in some cases. Educators and parents may tag these traits as problematic when in actuality the child’s learning style has not been taken into consideration. Once it is understood that the child is a tactile/kinesthetic learner, there are easy ways parents and educators can adapt teaching and parenting moments to aid in learning and development.
According to FamilyEducation.com, most school-aged children benefit from kinesthetic learning activities where touching, feeling, and experiencing is allowed, especially at the preschool and kindergarten level. As the child develops, her personality and learning style evolves, and parents and educators can specify through observation and interactions what type of learning style best fits the child. But, even if a child is a visual or auditory learner, tactile and kinesthetic learning experiences are still beneficial just as visual and auditory activities also benefit kinesthetic learners.
When teaching and learning with a kinesthetic child there are simple ways parents and educators can tap into the child’s inner need to move and touch. Try tactics such as:
Take Five: Kinesthetic learners can easily be led off track by what is happening around them. Within the classroom, create a spot where kinesthetic learners can go to take a break when they are feeling overwhelmed or distracted. They can count and do ten jumping jacks, set a timer for one minute and see how many times they can hop in place, or rock in a rocking chair for an allotted amount of time. Encourage the child to do activities quietly so as not to disturb other children within the classroom. Or, if at home, take short study breaks often with your child and do a quick dance party or game of Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.
Take Notes: Either at home or in the classroom, offer a pencil and paper to the kinesthetic learner to take notes or draw while learning. This offers the child the opportunity to stay active but in a contained and controlled way. Also, the act of writing encourages the child to remember learning facts and stay motivated. Along with a paper and pencil, offer a colored marker for the child to underline facts they find most important or interesting while writing. This way when she goes back to take another look at her notes, she’ll focus on the items that she highlighted.
Stay Active: Integrate movement activities or hands-on opportunities while introducing information to the kinesthetic child. Playing physical games are a wonderful way to learn math concepts. Try throwing and catching a ball while counting, or adding and subtracting the amount of baskets a child can make. Within the classroom, integrate clapping while singing the A,B,C’s or saying the multiplication tables. At home the child can head outdoors and jump rope while being quizzed on spelling words for an upcoming test.
Kinesthetic children are tactile, vivacious, energetic, and enthusiastic. They just need a helping hand to lead them in learning, as well as opportunities to move their bodies within the environment.
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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Throughout life there are many times when outside influences change or influence decision-making. The young child has inner motivation to learn and explore, but as he matures, finds outside sources to be a motivating force for development, as well. Along with being a beneficial influence, there are moments when peer pressure can overwhelm a child and lead him down a challenging path. And, peer pressure is a real thing – it is not only observable, but changes the way the brain behaves.
As a young adult, observational learning plays a part in development through observing and then doing. A child sees another child playing a game in a certain way and having success, so the observing child tries the same behavior. Albert Bandura was a leading researcher in this area. His famous bobo doll studies found that the young child is greatly influenced by observing other’s actions. When a child sees something that catches his attention, he retains the information, attempts to reproduce it, and then feels motivated to continue the behavior if it is met with success.
Observational learning and peer pressure are two different things – one being the observing of behaviors and then the child attempting to reproduce them based on a child’s own free will. Peer pressure is the act of one child coercing another to follow suit. Often the behavior being pressured is questionable or taboo, such as smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol.
Recent studies find that peer pressure influences the way our brains behave, which leads to better understanding about the impact of peer pressure and the developing child. According to studies from Temple University, peer pressure has an effect on brain signals involved in risk and reward department, especially when the teen’s friends are around. Compared to adults in the study, teenagers were much more likely to take risks they would not normally take on their own when with friends. Brain signals were more activated in the reward center of the brain, firing greatest during at risk behaviors.
Peer pressure can be difficult for young adults to deal with, and learning ways to say “no” or avoid pressure-filled situations can become overwhelming. Resisting peer pressure is not just about saying “no,” but how the brain functions. Children that have stronger connections among regions in their frontal lobes, along with other areas of the brain, are better equipped to resist peer pressure. During adolescence, the frontal lobes of the brain develop rapidly, causing axioms in the region to have a coating of fatty myelin, which insulates them and causes the frontal lobes to more effectively communicate with other brain regions. This helps the young adult to develop judgment and self-control needed to resist peer pressure.
Along with the frontal lobes contributing to the brain and peer pressure, other studies find that the prefrontal cortex plays a role in how teens respond to peer pressure. Just as with the previous study, children that were not exposed to peer pressure had greater connectivity within the brain as well as abilities to resist peer pressure.
The teenage years are exciting years. The young adult is often going through physical changes due to puberty, adjusting to new friends and educational environments, and learning how to make decisions for themselves. Adults can offer a helping and supportive hand to young adults when dealing with peer pressure by considering the following:
Separation: Understanding that this is a time for the child to separate and learn how to be his own individual is important. It is hard to let go and allow the child to make mistakes for himself, especially when you want to offer input or change plans and actions, but allowing the child to go down his own path is important. As an adult, offering a helping hand if things go awry and being there to offer support is beneficial.
Talk it Out: As an adult, take a firm stand on rules and regulations with your child. Although you cannot control whom your child selects as friends, you can take a stand on your control of your child. Setting specific goals, rules, and limits encourages respect and trust, which must be earned in response. Do not be afraid to start talking with your child early about ways to resist peer pressure. Focus on how it will build your child’s confidence when he learns to say “no” at the right time and reassure him that it can be accomplished without feeling guilty or losing self-confidence.
Stay Involved: Keep family dinner as a priority, make time each week for a family meeting or game time, and plan family outings and vacations regularly. Spending quality time with kids models positive behavior and offers lots of opportunities for discussions about what is happening at school and with friends.
If at any time there are concerns a child is becoming involved in questionable behavior due to peer pressure, ask for help. Understand that involving others in helping a child cope with peer pressure, such as a family doctor, youth advisor, or other trusted friend, does not mean that the adult is not equipped to properly help the child, but that including others in assisting a child, that may be on the brink of heading down the wrong path, is beneficial.
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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You are what you eat, and what you eat helps your body grow and develop in amazing ways. Even adults can continue developing and growing, especially when it comes to your brain. Several foods are extremely beneficial in aiding the brain to develop healthfully from birth through adulthood, and also assist with the aging brain, too.
The brain thrives on several elements, mainly glucose, vitamins, minerals, and other essential chemicals, with glucose, or a simple sugar that is one of the main components in carbohydrates, being the most essential. Glucose encourages the brain to create new connections and add myelin, or the fatty sheath to axons. Axons are long threadlike parts of nerve cells where impulses are conducted from cell body to other cells. If the brain receives too much of one component or not enough of another, it is not able to function properly or create new connections.
From birth, the brain is ready for rich nutrients to aide in the healthy development of the central nervous system. At birth, the brain contains 100 billion neurons, the most the brain will ever have. Along with all those neurons, synapses, or connections between brain cells, are also rapidly developing. And, once born, infant’s that are breast-fed have a slight cognitive advantage over formula-fed babies. Diet is not the only thing essential to an infant’s developing brain. Those raw brain cells are ready to soak up as much information as possible, and engaging in interactive play and providing lots of physical affection aides in healthy development, too.
Once a child hits adolescence, the brain undergoes another big growth spurt – correlating with the body’s development. During these essential years, the teenager begins making more and more decisions for herself, including what she likes and dislikes eating. Through MRI research, it has been found the teenager’s brain goes through a “use-it-or-lose-it” phase where if certain neurons have not been exercised they are lost. The frontal lobe goes through great developments during this time and encouraging healthy eating habits aides in the brain’s development as well as the teenager’s day-to-day functioning. There are even fun ways to sneak those healthy foods into school lunches that will not cause teens to toss their lunch but actually enjoying eating brain-boosting foods.
In older adulthood, memory can be boosted through various exercises, even meditation, but is greatly enhanced through proper diet. The adult brain continues to grow and develop and is greatly expanded by outside stimuli. Participating in new and different activities, staying social, getting a good night sleep, and exercising play a role. But, eating a healthy diet and maintaining proper hydration is what keeps the brain ticking. Fresh fruits and vegetables should be a main part of any adult’s diet.
No matter what your age, there are simple ways to change your diet to include brain-boosting foods the whole family will love. As adults, enjoying fresh fruits and vegetables models positive eating behaviors to children and encourages them to try new things. Other foods rich in healthy brain boosters include:
-Salmon: Not only is this fish full of flavor, it is packed with omega-3 fatty acids, which helps brain cells function at their best. Tuna and sardines are also fishy options high in omega-3. Adding salmon into a family meal is as easy as broiling fillets, or adding canned salmon to your favorite pasta.
-Blueberries: These small sweet and tart berries are full of antioxidants and are rich in Vitamins C and E. Antioxidants fight aging as well as the effects of free radicals, which are unstable molecules found in everyday items and are also created in the human body during metabolism. Without antioxidants to fight them, free radicals can reek havoc on the body and speed the aging process. Adding blueberries to your morning cereal or even to a fresh salad adds a touch of sweetness as well as lots of brain-boosting power.
-Nuts: Along with seeds, nuts are full of fiber and lots of beneficial fats. A handful of nuts or seeds provides the body with long-term energy through their high concentration of complex carbohydrates and Vitamin E. The healthy carbohydrates found in nuts boost the brain productivity and alertness. Offering nuts or seeds as a snack keeps hunger away and is a healthy option instead of chips. Almonds are the best choice, with peanuts offering the least amount of healthy fat than any other type of nut.
-Green vegetables: Although not everyone’s favorite, green, leafy veggies are an essential component for a brain-boosting diet. Fresh vegetables are full of antioxidants, which along with fighting free radicals also reduce the risk of developing cognitive impairments. The best bets are spinach, Brussels sprouts, and broccoli. Even if you are not a fan, adding chopped fresh spinach to pasta creates a healthy meal, and creating a purée of steamed broccoli makes a fun and different side dish for any meal.
So, what are you waiting for? Start adding some healthy brain-boosting foods to your diet today.
Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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As you endure your child’s horrid noises while he attempts to play the violin, recorder, or piano, just remember that along with learning how to play a musical instrument, he is boosting his brain for learning and understanding math. Yes, the brain finds music and math to be a happy combination, so encouraging your child to continue pounding away at that piano is a good thing if you want him to be able to properly balance his checkbook later in life.
The brain is divided into two hemispheres -the right and the left. The left-brain is in charge of rational thought and logical sequencing. The right brain takes over when dealing with creativity. Most individuals lean toward the left-brain, but some are more right-brained. The goal is to use both sides of the brain to their greatest potential to create a complete human being. Kids are able to find ways of doing this through expressing themselves creatively – which includes playing an instrument.
Playing and understanding music is fun, and also challenging. For those of us that were part of orchestra or band in our educational years, we remember the challenges of keeping the steady beat, learning how to read sheet music, and working together with a group to create somewhat beautiful music. The thing is, there is more math involved in the process than we think. Integrating learning math with music is beneficial to both learning a musical instrument and honing math skills – and potentially offers children skills that will benefit them for years to come.
There have been many studies that link listening to music to improving test results, coined the “Mozart Effect.” Research by Dr. Francis Raucher and Dr. Gordan L. Shaw of University of California Irvine found when children were regularly exposed to classical music, they were better able to perform spatial tasks, such as learning concepts easily, problem solving, and accomplishing challenging activities. Although there is no research proving that exposing babies to classical music while in the womb promotes math skills later in life, playing music for children of all ages offers the opportunity for them to hear patterns and rhythms in music that they are able to respond to and recognize over repeated exposure.
It is even thought that Mozart himself used mathematic concepts to create his enjoyable music. The golden section – the precise way of dividing a line, musically or mathematically, may have played a role in Mozart’s musical creations. Music is comprised of beats, which add up to create sections similar to concepts found in mathematical equations. So, it adds up that music and math intertwine in ways that entice the brain to combine its creative and logical sides into one.
Most mathematical calculations have solutions, and understanding the pattern leads to greater learning. According to Raucher, children that are offered instrumental instruction had higher test scores and were able to better accomplish tasks using spacial-temporal cognition, hand-eye coordination and arithmetic. Raucher also finds there is a strong link between visual and spatial skills that are used when children play and practice playing music. When children spend time practicing an instrument, they also pay attention to detail and are disciplined, which are valuable skills needed when learning challenging math concepts. This strengthens the mental-physical connection in the brain and body.
The concept of spatial-temporal reasoning is the ability to visualize patterns, come to solutions, and understand multi-stop problems. Most often, these are concepts associated with math, but spatial-temporal reasoning is essential to our everyday life. When children are exposed to music, through either playing or listening, neurons in the brain fire, causing certain parts of the brain to engage, and even enlarge, in certain cases. The cortex, responsible for higher thought and development, is stimulated when a child plays or listens to music. The right brain is stimulated through expressing itself creatively by playing music, and the left is encouraged through making logical decisions while reading sheet music and playing the instrument. This means the brain works together, which as stated earlier, optimizes brain functions.
Through all the research pointing to the theory that young children’s brains are hard-wired to receive and decode music (through playing and listening), providing wonderful benefits in the areas of math, it would seem logical that every school would include musical education in their programs. But, many schools are unable to fund musical instruction, so they offer a musical curriculum based on singing songs and listening to music. Parents can encourage music and mathematical knowledge through seeking out private music lessons or encouraging musical exploration in the home. Offering children musical instruction in an open and age-appropriate way offers young children the opportunity to develop at their own pace without pressure.
The next time your child is pounding away on the family piano or screeching while practicing the recorder, just remember, his brain is learning in amazing ways, and eventually he will be making wonderful music and hopefully completing those challenging algebraic equations with ease!
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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Kids are not going to come running when you offer them a brown bag lunch filled with brain food. In fact, most are going to turn the other way and run as fast as they can! But, parents can sneak brain healthy foods into their kid’s lunch (without too big of a fuss from either parent or child), and aid in boosting a child’s brainpower and learning abilities.
Along with tasting good, food provides important energy for the body – which includes the brain. Filling lunches with brain healthy foods will give your child a jump-start on understanding those tricky math equations and remembering vocabulary words. Brain boosting foods work together to improve memory, encourage energy and brain function, along with keeping the body full of healthy nutrients essential for getting through the school day.
When your child helps pack her lunch, she learns about making smart food choices as well as basic cooking skills. It is also an opportunity to spend some quality time together, and take the chance to talk about how things are going in school, exciting activities taking place, and all the new friends being made.
While packing a brown-bag-brain-boosting lunch, explain to kids why certain foods are being included and for what reason. When your child is clued into why specific items are important, she can share her knowledge with others and she can potentially positively influence friends to eat healthy, too.
According to AskDrSears.com, breakfast is an important part of getting school aged children energetic and healthy throughout the day. Offering scrambled eggs, whole-grain toast with peanut butter, or granola cereal with berries and yogurt will get kids started right. But, following up with a healthy lunch is the best way to prevent crashing after lunch, alleviating potentially lowered attention span and general lethargy. Stocking the pantry with healthy food items makes creating brain boosting lunches easy and sets a positive example for kids when selecting healthy snacks after school.
Whole Grains
Boosting brainpower is as simple as switching over to whole grain bread or tortillas for making sandwiches or wraps. Using whole-grain pasta for lunch-box pasta salads also adds the extra nutrients needed for positive long-lasting energy. Whole grain food items are high in folate and other B vitamins that help improve memory function and are also full of fiber, keeping your child’s tummy full longer.
Legumes
Beans are high in just about everything that your child’s brain needs such as protein, thiamin for energy, vitamin B6 for normal brain function, and folate, which helps to create important red blood cells. Yes, most children are more familiar with the silly rhyme about beans than their health benefits, but packing beans in your child’s lunch can be just as fun. If you have a picky eater, or a young vegetarian, offering bean brain boosting food items for lunch is a tasty option.
Along with providing a high-protein main item for lunch, kids need colorful fruits and veggies to encourage brain development, stay full longer, and provide the body with healthy minerals and vitamins. The darker the color of fruit or vegetable the brain-healthier – making blueberries, red peppers, strawberries, or carrots ideal side items for a complete brown bag lunch.
A healthy brain boosting lunch can be deterred when paired with items that are high in artificial sweeteners and food colorings. Concentrate on fresh all-natural items to keep your child’s brain buzzing and developing in a healthy way.
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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Kids do the darndest things, which sometimes lands them in a bit of trouble. The developing brain is full of adventure, and children often don’t think before they act – not because they want to cause mischief, but because they are interested in seeing what will happen. And, what sometimes happens is a couple of minutes in time-out.
The child’s brain is hardwired to be creative and inquisitive. The desire to explore is innate and some might say present from birth. A child is a motivated learner, and often the best learning happens through trial and error. As a parent, figuring out the best way to deal with a child’s misbehavior can be challenging. Parents often turn to time-out or other shame-based discipline to encourage different behavior from their child. But, is putting a child in an isolated spot to think about their actions helping or hurting his budding brain? Often the child isn’t excited about participating in time-out, parents get more frustrated, and in the end, nothing seems to have been resolved.
From birth, babies learn from clues they observe around them. You might even say that babies are the best at paying close attention to facial clues – able to pick up on mom’s adoring smile or older brother’s frustrated face. Babies take this learning and turn it into understanding of emotion and the beginnings of behavior, which is often mimicked and returned. When children are neglected or left to cry it out, there is a chance the brain is not encouraged to develop in positive ways. A recent article from The Guardian suggests that leaving babies to cry for extended lengths of time without a loved one’s nurturing could lead to long-term emotional problems. When stressed, the body releases a hormone called cortisol, which in large amounts can be damaging to a baby’s developing brain. And, anxiety in young children, in response to being isolated or left to cry for extended amounts of time, can potentially last through adulthood.
The brain is split into two halves, the right and the left. The right is in charge of creativity, with the left taking charge of logical thought. The brain works together to create a harmonious being, and behavior is part of the brain’s processes. Along with the right and left brain, the limbic system contributes to the brain (and body’s) behavior. It is not just the brain in charge of decision making, environment and genetics are part of the equation, too. If a child is exposed to positive modeling for making smart decisions, they are more apt to follow lead. That means when parents resort to spanking or talking down when bad decisions are made, it does not necessarily mean that the child will do the right thing next time, but just that he might follow in his parent’s footsteps by hitting or yelling. It can also cause stress in young children, resulting in long lasting psychological impact.
Keying kids into the understanding that discipline and punishment are not synonymous is a step in the right direction toward positive behaviors. Dr. Robert Brooks, Ph.D, writes in his essay Spanked With Words: More Damaging Than We May Realize, that through his conversations with children, punishment often teaches children what not to do rather than reinforcing what they should do. Strong consequences should be put in place when bad decisions are made, but should not in any way be enforced through humiliation, fear, or embarrassment to children. Instead, children should be instilled with the knowledge and understanding of self-discipline and that certain behaviors are unacceptable. Part of a parent’s responsibility is to find ways to effectively discipline a child without shame-based tactics.
So, the next time your child is pushing his exploratory limits, determine if it is yourself that might need a moment to think about your next behavior and not your child. Taking a breath before disciplining your child may be the most important thing you can do in encouraging him to do the right thing. Here are a couple of other helpful hints for creating interactions with your child that will produce positive behavioral connections:
Your young child’s brain is ready for positive reinforcement and encouraging information on how to work through challenging moments. Take the time to model positive behavior to help create a healthy home environment for the whole family.
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent. Visit Sarah’s website here.
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Most young children are excited about doing a creative activity, while others rush through a project or are quick to complain, “I can’t draw.” The child that doodles while listening to directions instead of attentively keeping eye contact frustrates many a teacher. Some adults might struggle to understand their child’s quirky obsession with wearing matching clothing at all times. This actually has more to do with the brain than one might think. A young child’s brain is simply letting its dominant side take over, and not blending with the other in order to reach its full potential.
The brain is divided into two hemispheres – the right and left. The right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, with the left side dominant over the right. The right side of the brain is in charge of creative, social, visual skills and intuition. The left sides takes over with sequencing, language, math, and rational thoughts. Deep within the brain lies the visual cortex, which is stimulated through viewing and creating visual arts. Semir Zeki writes that, “visual arts contributes to our understanding of the visual brain because it explores and reveals the brain’s perceptual capabilities.”
With most kids more comfortable using their right hand, they begin their journey as left- brain dominant not tapping into their right-brain potential. Celeste Carneiro finds that if we spent more time stimulating the right side of the brain we would “search out the integration of the two hemispheres, balancing the use of our potentials.” This is something that many adults forget, as they are left-brain dominant themselves, potentially causing a lack of creative stimulation for budding children.
To understand which side of the brain is dominant in a child, adults can observe how the child responds to various situations. Diane Connell, Ed.D, finds children who prefer to work alone, and find researching and analyzing facts interesting are left-brain dominant. Children who are right-brain dominant enjoy art projects and hands on activities over writing papers and doing research.
Along with the right side of the brain having a significant role in creativity, the Neuro Psychiatry Reviews finds the “frontal lobe to be the part of the cortex that is most important for creativity, being critical for divergent thinking,” and that the ways family and friends encourage the development of the frontal lobe encourages independent and divergent thinking. Divergent thinking stimulates kids to look at things differently, use creative thought processes for decision-making, and motivates them to ask lots and lots of questions.
So, how to encourage right-brain thinking in children? Betty Edwards, an art teacher known for her book Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, developed ways to encourage others to tap into their hidden creativity and stop the “I can’t draw” stigma. Through various exercises, Edward’s desire was to help others train their brains to draw in different ways.
Encouraging kids brains to be more right-brain dependent can be as easy as doing some creative activities that don’t overwhelm or frustrate left-brain learners. Right-brain dominant kids might also need some assistance in getting excited about researching that essay or finding ways to organize their room. Just as Carneiro stated, finding ways to encourage the use of both sides of the brain creates a complete human, resulting in harmony and the use of its full potential. It is not a question of either/or – right brain or left brain.
No matter the age of the child, spend time looking at, discussing, and creating art. This will stimulate his frontal lobe, visual cortex, and help train his right and left-brain to work together.
By Sarah Lipoff. Sarah is an art educator and parent.
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