Download What Are They Thinking? Understanding Your Child’s Brain

What Are They Thinking?
Understanding Your Child’s
Brain Development
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SYNAPSES:
Brain Cells Are Making Connections!
•Synapses(connections) are
created in the brain while
the fetus is still in the
womb.
•In the last months of
pregnancy, the fetus is
able to hear external sounds and see
light. He feels when his mother rubs
her expanded belly.
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Your Own Brain…is a three pound
universe!
• You have at least 100 billion nerve cells
(neurons) in your brain.
• Each of the neurons makes between 5,000
and 50,000 connections with other neurons.
• If you multiply 100 billion neurons times
10,000 contacts, you end up with how many
connections?
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1 Quadrillion!
Learning & Our Brains
The more senses you use the more you remember. Think about things you remember through the senses.
Sensory Memory
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Short Term
Memory
Long Term
Memory
Synapses Gone Wild!
In the early years, children’s brains form twice as many
synapses (connections) as they will eventually need. If
used in a child’s day to day life, they’re reinforced and
become part of the brain’s permanent circuitry. If not,
they are eliminated .
Rethinking the Brain:New Insights into Early Development by Rima Shore (NY: Families and Work
Institution: Drawing by H.T. Chugani
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The Brain of a One Year Old looks
more like an Adult’s than a
Newborn!
Black = Activity
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• Size of a large Grapefruit or
Cantaloupe
• Shaped like the meat of a walnut
• Grayish white/beige color
• Can be cut with a Butter Knife
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The depth of what children learn is
astounding…
• By 2 ½ children have sense of place and
relationship
PBS Kermit Loves a Bucket
• By 9 months children can discriminate
between kind and unkind behavior
PBS Social Networks and the Spark
•
By one day a child’s brain can
differentiate between b and p
PBS Children and the Brain (4th one down)
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Popcorn Activity
1. One person “POPS” with a “Did You
Know” Statement and reads it aloud
2. Sit down when finished
3. Then another person “POPS” up
4. Continue until all statements are read
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“M-Space”
Ability to hold certain number of facts in
short term memory…
• The capacity of short-term memory appears to
develop with age. The number of spaces increases
by one unit every other year beginning at age three.
Each block is a piece of information.
 Juan Pascual-Leon, 1970
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Memory Activity
How much information can you remember?
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Myth & Facts Activity
Seven Myths of Learning
1. Pair up with
a partner
“Cookie
Mingle”
2. Mingle about a Myth and a Fact
3. When bell rings, change partners
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BrainyTips for a richer
literacy environment…
• Books, music, toys
developmental level
• Form secure attachments
• Include your child in conversations
• Read, read and read some more with your
child.
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Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
Sing
Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes
Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes
Eyes and ears and mouth and nose
Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes
Say between verses….
Touch your eyes, touch your ears, touch your
mouth, touch your nose
touch your knees, touch your toes - Great job!
Sing again
Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes
Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes
Eyes and ears and mouth and nose
Head, shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes
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