Anne White of Dewey’s Treehouse and Ambleside Online referenced an article in today’s K-W Record that read:”…by the time children take their first steps into the kindergarten room, mostly at age four, it’s too late to change the way their brain has been wired for learning…..
Low-income children in North Carolina, who were taken to a preschool early development program that started a few weeks after birth, had much higher IQ scores by age six than those who hadn’t been in the program. The program not only had one teacher for every three children, but also involved parents in providing supplemental education at home. The effects were not only dramatic, but also long-lasting: By early adulthood, these students still had much better reading and math scores. And their mothers became better educated and were more likely to be employed.
..children who hadn’t been in the preschool program, but received an enriched program once they entered elementary school, had limited and temporary success. Their gains were only about one-quarter the significance of those who got both the early development program and the enriched school program. And these gains also dwindled over the next 13 years.”
The author of the report, Dr. Mustard, concludes with this story (truly, every new parent should thoughtfully consider the ramifications of this article):
“Decades ago, when he lived on a farm near Mount Forest, Mustard came home one night to be told that a barn cat had died and her kittens would therefore have to be drowned. He hated to do it, so instead he fed the kittens by hand.
They all survived and we kept one,” Mustard recalled. “He was totally attracted to me.”
And even 20 years later, when that cat was blind and deaf, he would still find Mustard by smell, and crawl into his lap.
“Humans are no different,” Mustard said.”
I believe humans are vastly different as we are made in the image of God… but I adamantly concur: we attach to those who nourish us when we are young. I want my children close, here… so they can crawl up into my lap. May I be so bold as to submit that Mama-love and Papa-love simply cannot be substituted… and that love means nourishing times of reading together. Long hours of arms links, and bodies touching, and souls and minds growing. Time well spent.
Books ordered today for a little girl who I can’t believe is about to turn two:
Carry Me — touch, sing, read, carry–a message I want to repeat to me…and to her.
Eloise Wilkin Stories –illustrations I want her to remember
Pickle-Chiffon Pie — a story I don’t want her to forget
Mud Pies and Other Recipes: A Cookbook for Dolls — for long summer days under the spreading maple–the stuff of childhood
All titles, excepting the latter (a Melissa Wiley recommendation), come with splendiferous reviews from Chinaberry–most worthwhile reviews and offerings.
Are you reading copiously? Teaching the Trivium, by Harvey and Laurie Bluedorn, urges to read two hours a day to our children–daily brain food. Thus immersing in literature is one of our daily seven rungs.
Perhaps you’d like to take a moment to share your current reading stack and that of each of your young readers with Diane at A Circle of Quiet–she will be posting intriguing reader’s lists. Or read weekly at Elise’s Children’s Book Monday —considered reviews of books for which to finger your library shelves.
Read. It matters.
