Research

Post by Lisa C.

Results from a recent study show that babies as young as 13 months old can determine if an adult it reliable based on past experience with adult behavior. I found this article fascinating. It really shows how important it is that we are a positive and consistent presence in a baby’s life. Check out the article from Live Science.

A researcher at Ben-Gurion University in Israel has discovered that performing hand-clapping rhymes and songs helps children develop improved writing, spelling, and cognitive abilities, among other results. We know that clapping out syllables helps very young children develop phonological awareness. This study, however, looked at children in first, second and third grades, so it seems continuing this simple activity beyond kindergarten produces even more benefits.
 

A study in the journal Pediatrics has concluded that children who have limited vocabulary and language skills at age 5 are more likely to have lower literacy levels in adulthood.  However, the study also found that adults who overcame this childhood language deficit were most often those who were read to by their parents. "Our study suggests that reading to a child might also have long-term beneficial effects," [Dr. Ingrid Schoon] said.

According to Alison Gopnik, University of California, Berkeley psychologist, research is changing our understanding of the first years of life, showing early childhood to be a period of intellectual, emotional, and moral development. "Any child will put the most productive scientist to shame," she writes in her new book, The Philosophical Baby." Read the full article here.

An article in the Seattle Times discusses new brain research that affirms that babies are learning even before birth. Parents are therefore a child's first and most important teachers. "The bottom line, scientists say, is that no amount of teacher training, brain scans or curriculum research can trump the parent-child connection."