What’s Going On Up There? Significant Brain Development Research 1. Brains are developing pathways for learning ACTIVITY: Making connections with crepe paper, string, or yarn to imitate creation of neural pathways in brain

What’s Going On Up There? Bodies -- cells Brains -- connections between cells At birth, the body is small. As the body grows more cells, the body gets bigger. The brain gets bigger, too, as it grows more cells. Forming connections between the brain cells is critical when children are very young.

What’s Going On Up There? Brain has ~100 billion cells at birth Like little towns with no roads Needs roads or “pathways” between cells.

What’s Going On Up There? Pathway development: Before birth Sensory stimulation Electrical impulses Pathways Repetition = strength Pathway development: Begins before birth Occurs with sensory stimulation Stimulation causes electrical impulses Impulses cause pathways Repetition of impulses = strong pathways Image from www.kiddsmart.com/neuron%20graph.htm

What’s Going On Up There? Make brain pathways! See Touch Activities that stimulate the senses help create brain pathways. Repeating these activities strengthens the pathways. Hear Taste Smell

What’s Going On Up There? Unstimumlated brains: Few pathways Pruning Pathway development slows Around age 5, the brain starts “pruning” away the brain cells that don’t have connections to other brain cells. It’s like destroying little towns that have no roads connecting them to other little towns. Pathway development slows down after early childhood years “Brain Cell Connections” image from www.acceleratedlearning.com/preschool/concept.htm

What’s Going On Up There? Window of opportunity: Build brain pathways: Ages birth - 5 Sensory activities Repetition We have a “window of opportunity” to help children build strong brain pathways from birth – age 5 by engaging them repeatedly in activities that stimulate the senses.