To stimulate the brain.

When we wish to proceed with a project, and we have settled the problem of giving time to it, then we ought to start with it immediately when we know what to do to achieve the necessary success. As we already know, we should start developing our children's brain, together with its body, the day the children are born, if not after the fourth month of conception in the womb.

The next question is what can we do to stimulate the growth and development of our beloved children. Yes, the aim is to stimulate so that the brain would respond and develop to accommodate the knowledge or skill necessary for the child's growth in every possible sphere.

Knowledge involves understanding while skill involves movement. Together they help the child to develop every part of him/her to the highest potential possible. Both ought to be developed together.

In stimulating the brains of our children, the parents are the most important people. They are the children's first and most suitable teachers. Teaching begins with them and they are the ones most knowledgeable or understanding of their own children. If, due to circumstances beyond their control, parents are unable to spend sufficient time with their children to make a difference, then these parents still have the responsibility to ensure the right guardians or child-minders are selected to do the job of stimulating the minds of their children.

Where does all the stimulation and training start? Well, the whole world is our classroom and all audio visual aids as well as practical training venues are found in it. How big your world is depends upon the time available and the expences needed. Everything else in here in this world.

For a start, the cot and the surrounding space in a room is the baby;s world. In it are also the parents, possibly brothers or sisters and grandparents. Of course, there are the toys hung above the cot.

Linguistic intelligence and interpersonal intelligence are the starting points. Parents and other humans who come into contact should speak in proper language and not baby talk which will be useless and discarded soon. Talk to the baby even though there is no responce. Greet the baby, ask questions or make comments on the baby's actions, smile, toys, food and the weather. We could talk as though the baby understands everything there is to say. Vocabulary is being registered in the brain. Later, all this will quicken the child's learning process.

Play with the child, get him/her to smile and laugh. Move the toy hung above the cot and get his eyes to follow the action as early as possible. The suitable toy should provide sound as well as moovement. Let the baby enjoy and register the sound of bells or any other clanging sounds.

Next, we can introduce texture to the child. Let the child know smoothness and roughness and any other textures available. Introduce the new words on textures. Allow the baby to mouth his/her fingers and toys after ensuring that they are clean and safe from dirt, germs and lead.

Then, there is movement. Get the child to move his hands and legs as well as turn his/her head.

Carry the baby and give the baby a chance to bond. Play with your baby. Let others bond with your baby too so that your child has an early start at interpersonal intelliegence development. Some children are so used to only their parents and siblings that they avoid strangers and find it difficult to enjoy the closeness of others.

From the cot and the home, the child widens his/her world into the garden and the neighbourhood. Talk about the new things he/she encounters here. Let the child experience the places. Parents' method of stimulating the child's brain for knowledge and skill is similar with slight variations. Again the verbal-linguistic intelligence is stimulated except that the child by now could start to ask questions which needed to be answered. If the parents can read up or learn in order to provide interesting and provoking answers to arouse curiousity, the brain would want to know more. Of course, the more is known, the more there is to know. If parents cannot provide the right answers, then the parents can take the child further afield to the library, the book-shop, the internet, the acquarium (At this point I still remember very well the little boy I saw at an acquarium shop who was full of questions for his delightful mother on all the fish and creatures seen in that place), the sundry shop, the supermarket, the wet-market, the public gardens, the zoo, art studios, musuems, the sea-side, the hills, the swamps, the rivers and any other place we can find in and around our town or village.

From here on, go and explore wherever and whatever is possible and within reach. Let the child know all there is to know within those six or seven years of his/her life.

Teach him/her to read and stimulate his/her love for reading. A love for reading is important as it is through books and the experiences of other people that we know and understand so many other things which is beyond our time and expenses to have.

Play is an important part of learning. Imagination is just as important. A child may discover the wonderful feeling of being able to cure others through pretending to be a doctor with a toy stethoscope and a stringe. Playing and taking apart watches and radios may anger parents as the expensive objects are destroyed in the process but it could be the result of curiousity to understand the workings of such things. We may be having an engineer or an inventor in our midst.

Talking about imagination, there was a time I saw parents dressing up their little children in graduates' attire and having them photographed. That was good, had the parents continued the process by telling the child that the first step to graduation is the ability to understand words well, read books and able to put thoughts and ideas on paper or in words. Then constantly remind the child of the path towards it with more stimulation towards whatever interests which could move the child towards that goal.

Many things in life require some kind of skill. For instance, a start could be made on skill development when the child has a bicycle. Show the child how to change a tyre or a bulb. Later, when the child grows up and is stronger, this child would know how to do it with a spanner and other instruments. Start with simple skills and go on to more difficult ones. Once a child has some skills mastered, he/she will be more than willing to learn whatever skills he/she comes across.

What about the child's bodily-kinesthetic intelligence? It all starts with walking, running, jumping, balancing, riding a bicycle, kicking footballs, throwing balls, bouncing balls; all of which leads to development of balance, agility, coordination, control, strength, stamina and endurance. With all these well developed, a child has the confidence to take on any sport he/she is interested in. He/She will not be left out in this field. Not only that, as many everyday actions require all these developments, he/she will find life so much easier to enjoy and be happy with. Almost anything would be within his/her reach. And the child will be stronger, healthier and fitter too. I wish to especially stress this point as an increasing number of parents think physical development not as important as verbal-linguistic development.

I remember that the one most important factor that removed whatever inferiority complex that I had as a child, was a strong and healthy body able to take on anythign physical as well as linguistic. With a healthy body, circulation is better and therefore, concentration is longer; and concentration is important in the classroom or the lecture room.

Well, all this will come to nought unless there are parents who would take on the job of developing their children's brains and bodies to their highest potential.