Carol Stovold Quality Kidz www.qualitykidz.co.nz Tauranga

As I mentioned last week, our brain is a most amazing machine. It is like an enormous computer but nothing man has invented can do as much as a brain can in as fast a time. Let me share some amazing insights with you.

Information in the brain is contained in neural pathways or the wired-up parts of the brain. Those 'ooh” moments are the ones you get when two neural pathways make a synaptic connection. Neural pathways are grown by laying down myelin, of which about 90 layers must coat the neuron for the learning or pathway to be consolidated in the brain.

The best way of consolidating knowledge is through repeated patterns. That's why your baby will throw things off the side of the highchair onto the floor to see what will happen about 90 times before that particular knowledge is consolidated. It is also why we talk about children's work being their play and the importance of them being able to repeat their activities over and over. They are doing this to consolidate knowledge.

Our bodies produce natural endorphins (feelings of exhilaration) which resemble drugs such as opium in their abilities to produce analgesia and a feeling of well-being. Endorphins help lay down myelin thicker and faster with the need for fewer repetitions. In other words, endorphins help the neuron pathways grow faster.

Happy learning helps the brain grow faster and better and the top three activities to produce endorphins to grow the brain are: 3. Exercise and movement, 2. Laughter and fun (movement) and 1. Singing and music (movement).

One of the best activities that will grow the brain of children under two is singing to them. For children over two, it is involving them and encouraging them to join in singing. Of course this highlights the importance of movement for young children. No parking them in front of a TV.

During the years 0-3 the brain develops neural pathways. If you could take all of these pathways and lay them in a line, they would reach to the moon and back four times! At the age of three the brain reaches the height of human complexity and the process of pruning begins. This process starts at three and peaks at around 16 years of age. Basically all of the neural pathways that are not used or fully coated in myelin are removed.

A fascinating example of this is that every child up to the age of three has the ability to speak every language natively. That is the ability to pronounce and speak it phonetically. People who have only ever heard one language spoken will specialise in that language. Those lucky enough, however, to have heard two or three languages spoken, will retain the ability to speak them fluently.

So, youngsters able to speak 60 words of each language in the first three years of life will be able to go on to learn that language and speak it fluently even if they don't pick it up again till years later.

Those who only ever heard one language can learn another, but we will always speak it with an accent.

Next week –more on the importance of 0 - 3