Article Submitted by Cindy Zimmermann, StarChild Academy Owner
Years ago, educators believed that, because young children could not verbally respond when spoken to, they did not understand, thus they concluded that exposing children to academics before they spoke was a waste of time.
Au contraire! Neuroscientists today would inform you that you have forgone the most critical years of learning if you wait to teach a child after they begin to speak. America’s failing and antiquated education system did not adjust to the neuroscientists’ findings and still continues to require a child to be at least five years old before entering the traditional American education system.
So before your child even enters the realm of the “American education system,” your child will already be behind other developed countries. He or she has wasted the most critical years of learning.
The human brain is divided into two cerebral hemispheres: the left hemisphere is used for rational reasoning and thinking and begins to mature around age five; the right hemisphere (right brain) is the creative and intuitive side of the brain and is fully functioning when a child is born.
Educators have not attempted to develop the right brain of students because they do not understand how it works and they lack the awareness that it is active and fully functioning at birth. However, now that we do have a better knowledge of how the right brain works, we should seize the opportunity to optimize the development of the right brain in children under age five. But first, educators in America will need to change their approach and attitude towards teaching this young age.
The right brain possesses the ability to retain complete images of things seen at a glance in the memory. This is how an infant recognizes its parents’ faces soon after birth. Young children learn best through repetitiveness and will retain information better if they see it and hear it frequently.
For the most effective teaching style, young students should hear and see information on a daily basis using flash cards, singing repetitive songs and chants, and performing repetitive writing exercises.
The right brain is also where languages are mastered. In our current education system, most students are not required to take their first foreign language until they are in high school. This is too late.
When adults attempt another language they spend years trying to learn it, but never really master it. Young children are linguistic geniuses. Children can master a language completely by age four. If you think about it, most American four year olds can fluently participate in a mature conversation with adults in English. In certain areas in Europe, children master up to five languages by age four.
Learning a new language not only develops and broadens the right brain, it will also benefit your child’s future. By the time your child enters the work force, it will be necessary to be multilingual to be successful in the global market.
In general, we as a country need to change our attitudes about teaching our young children. We need to take early childhood education as seriously as all the other developed counties that are surpassing us in test scores and academic abilities.
To advance our children’s academic ability and give them the competitive edge they will need for a successful future, we need to begin teaching our children at a much younger age and using more effective and proven techniques. Simultaneously, we need to change the attitude of our educators in America.
StarChild Academy (License number C09OR0170)is located at 1550 Wekiwa Springs Road in Apopka. You may reach them at 407-880-6060.
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