1. Ready to Raise PowerPoint Resource The Window of Opportunity in the Early Years
Please feel free to adapt these PowerPoint slides to your needs. Credit to both the original sources and to Ready to Raise is important!

2. Facilitation Instructions
Objective: Introduce the importance of the early years in a way that has people actively engaged. Bust assumptions, introduce brain development research and reinforce the concept of the power of prevention.
Acknowledgement:
The Human Early Learning Partnership for the Brain sensitivity slides with accompanying research and citations.
Heart-Mind Online for the video link of Dr. Clyde Hertzman using this graph in a presentation about attachment for the Dalai Lama Center for Peace + Education.
Instructions:  
Print out slide #3 as handout
See script including in the notes section of slides 3 - 5
Engage your audience in a discussion of the results, the research and their reactions
Explore further research (e.g. video on slide 5)
Hold an Impact Dialogue! (slide 6)

3. Sensitive Periods in Early Brain Development
Pre-school years
School years
High
Where are the sensitive periods for
Language?
Numbers?
Social Skills?
Sensitivity
Distribute Handouts. Keep slide 4 a SECRET!
Script:
There has been incredible amounts of research on the brain published in the last 20 years. Studies have been able to determine when, in a child’s life, the brain is the most READY to learn a variety of different physical, cognitive and emotional abilities. During these times, the brain makes all sorts of connections and a child learns quickly and easily. We say that the brain is highly sensitive during specific times and these are windows of opportunity for learning and development. On the blank chart - you will see that the y axis represents how “sensitive” the brain is, and the x axis represents how old the child is.  Your task now is to draw three lines that show when (at what ages) the brain is highly sensitive and less sensitive for three things: language, numbers and social skills.
Low 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Years

4. Sensitive Periods in Early Brain Development
Pre-school years
School years
High
Numbers
Peer social skills
Symbol
Sensitivity
Language
Habitual ways of responding
Emotional control
Show poster answers (animated slide)
How close were you?  Anyone particularly surprised at the actual graph?
Key Messages
As this graphic developed by the Council of Early Child Development shows, there are a series of sensitive periods of development between zero and school age - particularly in brain and biological development. This part of the life course exhibits the densest period of brain development (or brain sculpting) according to the kinds of experiences that child has had and/or the kinds of social and environmental exposures the child has had on a broader level.
Interpreting the Graphic
White Line – Vision: most sensitive at birth. Consider Face-to-breast distance of about 13 inches - good for looking for cues in human faces!
Dark Blue Line Hearing: at birth brain is receptive to expressive vocabulary!
Green Line – Habitual ways of responding: includes behaviours when interacting with others and in certain situations
Pink Line – Emotional Control: impact on relationships as well as self-regulation
Yellow Line – Language: famous study of social gradient in US children showed there was a 30 million word gap accumulated between the most privileged children and the least privileged children (based on whether they were read bedtime stories or not) by the time they reach school.
Red Line –Symbols: very early literacy skills
Light Blue – Peer socialization: most sensitive closer to 3 years old
Black Line – Numbers: last to peak…but still before the age of 4!
‘Sensitive periods’ in early brain development – this slide is based on the following references:
Doherty, G. (1997). Zero to Six: the Basis for School Readiness. Applied Research Branch R-97-3E Ottawa: Human Resources Development Canada.
McCain & Mustard (1999). Early Years Study. Toronto, Ontario: Publications Ontario.
Shonkoff, Jack (Ed) (2000). From Neurons to Neighborhoods: The Science of Early Childhood Development. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press.
© 2014 Human Early Learning Partnership
Vision – white line
Hearing
Low 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Years

5. Follow the link to watch Dr
Follow the link to watch Dr. Clyde Hertzman (Founding Director of HELP) explain this graph as it relates to early attachment and emotional awareness.

6. Impact Dialogue
If we know that key brain growth and development happens in the first years. How can we focus our efforts to ensure babies, toddlers and preschooler are in the VERY best environments possible ?
Customize to your group a dialogue question to carry the conversation to “So what can we do about it”.
Feel free to edit the question to align with your current community context!