“The hormones produced in the mother’s body during stress- ful times can cross over into the placenta, exposing the child. If it’s a chronic condition, it can lead to problems with brain development,” counsels Aamodt.
One 2008 review paper from Harvard Medical School led researchers to conclude that babies born to stressed mothers are more likely to suffer from autism spectrum disor- ders. Others, from researchers in Canada and the UK, found that women that endure natural disasters while pregnant are more likely to have babies that suffer from schizophrenia, decreased IQ and depression. Animal research has repeat- edly demonstrated that babies of stressed mothers often grow up with touchy stress-response systems. Switch off the baby videos. University of Washington researchers have found that baby educational videos, like Baby Einstein and Brainy Baby fail to boost language skills and may actually slow acquisition of vocabulary. “For every hour per day spent watching baby DVDs and videos, infants understood an average of six to eight fewer words than in- fants that did not watch them,” the report said. Other research by the American Academy of Pediatrics suggests that exposure to action-packed videos may increase the risk of development of attention disorders. “Babies are wired to learn from other people, and every period of time they are not interacting with people because they are watching TV inter- feres with that face-to-face interaction,” says Aamodt. Teach a second language. Bilingual children consis- tently outperform single-language speakers in tests of execu- tive brain function (a measure of organizational and planning skills) and tend to be better at making choices and understand- ing other people’s perspectives, Aamodt says. “The very first
act of speech for a bilingual person is picking which language to use, and you do that based on your understanding of the other person’s perspective.” Aamodt recommends exposing youngsters to a second language in infancy—if possible, just by speaking to them in a different language—and exploring more formal instruction before the age of 8. Foster self-control. “Ultimately, parents can make the biggest difference in their child’s adult quality of life by promoting self-control,” Aamodt says. Recent research published in the journal Science and elsewhere suggests that children with greater self-control (meaning they can resist temptation, stay on task and control their own behav- ior) achieve greater success in school, the workplace and their personal lives. “Preschool children’s ability to resist temptation is a much better predictor of academic success than their IQ scores,” Aamodt notes.
She recommends engaging and progressively more challenging tasks. “You want to stretch the child just a little; get them to do something a little bit hard, but that they can succeed at if they concentrate.” Encourage study breaks. “Some very old science tells us that to learn effectively, you need to take breaks and allow your brain to consolidate what you have already learned before you go back and try to learn some more,” says Aamodt. “If you study a total of an hour, you will learn twice as much if you break it up into two 30-minute spans.”
Hooray for recess.
Lisa Marshall is a freelance health writer headquartered near Boulder, CO. Connect at
Lisa@LisaAnnMarshall.com.
natural awakenings
February 2012
19
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