Showing posts with label child development. Show all posts
Showing posts with label child development. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 21, 2015
Pretend Play and Theory of Mind Have a Big Impact on Child Development
Learning Social Skills
When a child engages in
make-believe, she experiments with the social roles she’s familiar with in her
own life. She might take on the role of the Mom while playing house, giving her
a chance to walk in someone else's shoes and learn empathy for her own mother.
Pretend play also often includes cooperation with others. This teaches children
to take turns, share, problem solve and be creative.Increasing Emotional Skills
"Theory of mind" is the awareness that not everyone has the same opinions and that people see the world from different perspectives. This important emotional understanding increases with pretend play as children make-believe they're someone else. Imaginative play also builds self-esteem as children test their limits and see what they’re truly capable of.Developing Language Skills
It’s difficult to play with others without using language. If you listen in on your child playing pretend with friends, you’re bound to hear words and phrases you didn’t even know she knew. Creative play also often requires participants to reenact a story, which further helps language skills develop.Practicing Problem-Solving Skills
Whether two children want to play the same role or a group of friends needs to devise rules for a new game, pretend play calls for problem-solving skills. This becomes important for future play, as well as important situations later on in life.Encouraging Pretend Play
Over the past 75 years, numerous researchers and theorists have pinpointed the values of pretend play and the impact it has on child development. It’s clearly important to encourage fantasy games and creative play to help your child grow into a happy, thriving young adult.Image via Shutterstock.com
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Strong Listening Skills in Children Benefit More Than Just Behavior
Behavior
Children who know how to listen change their behaviors based on the observations they make. For instance, if a child sees her sister get a reward for bringing home an exemplary report card, she is likely to strive for good grades to receive the incentive as well. In this way, behavioral improvements often rely on the ability to listen and obverse carefully.Self-Discovery
When holding a discussion with children, their ability to listen gives them insight into their own opinions. Does one child agree with what another child says? As each individual makes that decision for themselves, they each discover their own personal ideas, interests and preferences. This self-discovery is vital for unlocking their individual possibilities.Relationships
Good listening skills foster deeper communication and stronger relationships. Children are more likely to build lasting friendships if they know how to give their full attention to their peers. A good listener becomes the person her friends want to confide in because she makes her friends feel appreciated and valued simply because she knows how to listen.Learning
Listening is vital to learning. Daydreamers in the classroom have a harder time concentrating and often have poorer memories. On the other hand, focused, active listeners grasp the content more quickly and implement what they learn both in their studies and in their everyday lives. Active listeners are more likely to have high grades and excellent comprehension of lessons than passive listeners.Image via Shutterstock.com
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Memory Toys Help Children Learn and Remember
- Play
with memory toys. Matching games such as bingo and memory match are ideal for improving
children’s memory skills. Choose memory toys that match lower and
upper-case letters and you also teach language skills.
- Ask
memory-related questions. When you drive by a friend’s
house, ask your child who lives there. When you get to the grocery store,
see if your child can direct you to the milk or the bread. After school,
ask what your child learned in class that day.
- Establish
routines. Children thrive on routine,
and it also helps them remember what comes next in the day. If the bedtime
routine is always the same, your child should anticipate this order and be
able to tell you what comes next: getting in pajamas, then brushing teeth,
followed by reading a story.
- Ensure
quality sleep for your child. Sleep is
not only essential for a child’s well-being, but it also enables the brain
to retrieve and assimilate facts from the day before. Young children from
about six months to age 3 should get 13 to 15 hours of sleep every day
with a long overnight rest and naps throughout the day.
- Offer
nutritious meals and snacks. Even before your child is
born, you should eat healthfully and take prenatal vitamins. Once you
welcome your baby into the world, nutritionists advise breastfeeding if at
all possible. Feed toddlers and school-age children nutritious foods such
as fruits and vegetables, lean protein, low-fat dairy and whole grains.
Avoid sugary drinks, candy and processed foods, and make sure your child
eats breakfast every morning and drinks plenty of water throughout the
day. Sending good fuel to the brain and staying hydrated makes it easy for
your child to develop and maintain a good memory.
For more tips to improve your child’s memory, please contact ListenLoveLearn. Then check out the memory toys available from ListenLoveLearn Toys.
Image via Shutterstock.com
Thursday, August 28, 2014
CU-Boulder Study Shows the Value of Play in Goal Achievement for Children
What is the value of play? Is structured activity best for kids, or do their goal achievement capabilities excel with more free time? These are the basic questions parents and policy makers ask each other regularly.
The Importance of Self-Directed Executive Functioning
To find the answers, the University of Colorado - Boulder led a study exploring children’s abilities to set and achieve goals based on whether their days are filled with structured activities or less-structured play. The study, which is published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, begins to unravel the value of play when it comes to goal achievement.
The ability to establish and reach goals independent of parental nagging is thanks to a child’s high level of “self-directed executive functioning.” That is to say, the child has the ability to connect previous experiences with current decisions, to exhibit mental control and self-regulation.
For example, a child knows to wear a coat without a parent’s coaxing and gets her homework done before dinner because she has plans that night. Because these simple acts demonstrate self-directed executive functioning – a skill that can increase wealth, promote health and decrease the chance of incarceration in adulthood – parents and experts are interested in learning how to improve this trait early in children’s lives.
Making the Connection Between Play and Goal Achievement
For the study, researchers asked parents of 6- and 7-year-olds to report their children’s activities for a week and categorize these activities as “structured” (such as doing chores, playing sports and taking lessons) or “less structured” (such as playing alone or with others, going on social outings, reading, and playing video games).
Next the researchers evaluated the children’s executive functioning skills with a verbal fluency assignment where the children chose when to switch to a new category. The study found that when children enjoy more less-structured activities, they apparently have more time to practice self-directed decision making. The results in academic and social situations are children who get better grades, have natural leadership skills and enjoy healthier relationships.
To learn more about the value of play, please contact ListenLoveLearn today.
Image via Shutterstock.com
Tuesday, August 26, 2014
When Children Build and Create, Does It Affect Their Brains? Harvard Wants to Know
Schools today place a heavy emphasis on sitting still, listening to lectures and memorizing information. What about creativity? What about interacting with the world around them? When children build and create, they are actively engaged in exploring new concepts firsthand.
Researchers from Harvard are scientifically exploring how building and creating affects children’s brains. The initiative, called Project Zero, has explored child and adult learning processes since 1967.
The most recent work of investigating what happens when children build and create is being conducted in public and private schools in Oakland, California. Researchers have teamed up with 15 participating teachers who meet every six weeks so the researchers can give teachers specific activities to incorporate into the lessons they already teach. Then teachers report back on classroom behavior and other observations gathered through surveys and conversations.
One example of an activity researchers asked teachers to include was to ask students to examine an object, looking at all of its separate parts first and then how all the parts fit together as a whole. One elementary school teacher had the children explore objects in the room, such as tennis shoes. A high school technology teacher asked students to examine the inner workings of a Google Doc. Some teachers asked the students to re-purpose the object so it performed a new function.
The Harvard researchers are excited to see the end results of this branch of Project Zero, a three-year project that began at the beginning of the school year in 2012. By the end of it, they expected to not only have academic research regarding how learning improves when children build and create, but to also understand what works and what doesn’t work in a classroom setting.
Give your children a chance to build and create at home with games and building blocks from LiveLoveLearnToys. Then contact LiveLoveLearn for more information.
Image via Shutterstock.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)