Download Toddlers

Early Childhood
Babies
Toddlers
brain matters
By Kim Johnson,
Ngala Parent Education Team
C
ontrary to common belief that young children do
not have memories until they are at least three,
researchers have discovered that children have memories
as early as in the womb. Although preverbal children are
not able to express a memory recall, memories are evident
in how they recognise significant people and how they
become familiar with the daily routines in their lives.
For the first 18 months, children encode implicit
memories which are formed through both the senses and
repetitive experiences. These can range from the sounds
and smells of their home and parents, the warm feeling
of being cuddled and the pleasant sensations and taste of
warm milk.
Implicit memories encode our earliest forms of learning
about the world. They directly shape our here and now
52 Offspring | autumn 2012
Concepts such as in and out, dry and wet, soft and hard,
events. But implicit memories can be negative as well, like
over and under, are abstract ideas for toddlers. They learn
when we’ve repeatedly had the opposite experience of our
these concepts when adults show them what up and down
parents being irritated by or ignoring our times of distress.
the stairs means, when they experience the hard floor,
Even though we’re not aware of their origins in the past,
implicit memories can create fear, avoidance, sadness, and
cuddle a soft teddy, etc and so on.
As the effectiveness of a child’s memory progresses
other painful emotions and bodily sensations even into
further, they can return to the activity they were doing
adulthood. Children will remember the strange sensation
even if they were interrupted. This is because they now not
of parental bodies stiffening in certain situations where
only remember what they were doing, but also the stage
there are loud and angry sounds.
they had reached before they were interrupted.
By age two, children will make great progress as
As the brain continues to mature, three year olds are
their language skills develop and enable them to gather
now beginning to grasp the concept of simple number
and express information in ways other than physical
sequence and different categories. They may start
exploration alone.
counting: “I have five fingers”, for example. They are
In their second year, they develop the ability to
learning the concept of categorisation. Five people in the
recall explicit memories or autobiographical memories
family in total: two adults (mum and dad), one girl (sister),
(factual and episodic). Explicit memories are the
one boy (brother) and one me!
memories to which we have given meaning, narrative
As their language skills continue to improve, memory
and understanding. This occurs as they acquire greater
and observation skills also improve. They now are able
language and understanding.
to provide an amazing amount of details about their
The continued development of their memory, together
with improving language skills, means that children are
Early Childhood
Babies
experiences without clues to their origins from past
experiences with their enhanced vocabulary.
Various parts of the brain need to work together in
beginning to form mental images of how things happen,
memory and learning. The hippocampus is involved in
which leads to understanding of concepts.
memory forming, organising and storing. It is a structure
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Offspring | autumn 2012 53
Early Childhood
Babies
This can only happen when the frontal cortex is
maturing. From 18 months onwards, the front part of the
frontal regions of the brain – an area called the prefrontal
cortex – will mature enough to enable the beginning of
autobiographical recall. That is why children aged two to
three years are able to recall and verbalise details from
events in their lives.
How can parents help? Toddlers need adults to make
sense of what they are experiencing and feeling. When
parents help them to put words to their feelings, they
are actually helping the child turn implicit memories to
explicit memories and this process actually integrates
different areas of the brain in language development,
memory encoding and storage for future use. Speaking
with children about their feelings helps them develop
emotional intelligence, which can help them understand
their own and other people’s feelings more fully.
that is particularly important in forming new memories
Ngala has developed a Building Young Children’s
and connecting emotions and senses, such as smell and
Brains DVD for families and professionals which will
sound, to memories. The hippocampus acts as a memory
be released in March 2012. Ngala also holds regular
sorting station by sending memories out to the appropriate
parenting workshops, ‘Building Brains’, for parents of
part of the cerebral hemisphere for long term storage and
children aged 0-5yrs. To book places please visit the Ngala
retrieving them when necessary.
website www.ngala.com.au
54 Offspring | autumn 2012