Roshi­ni Ramesh­wars­ingh

Like a good gar­den­er, you must tend lov­ing­ly to the bud­ding brain.Your child is a spe­cial gift from God to nur­ture and de­vel­op through your pos­i­tive thoughts and con­fi­dence. Each child has his/her own brain, which al­lows the child to think in or­der to ful­fill his/her dreams and vi­sions–pro­vid­ed you, as par­ents, are there to guide the child. You can help the child if you be­lieve you can do it. Through your con­fi­dence, you can teach the child from a very young age. With your sup­port and guid­ance, the child will not feel in­fe­ri­or but grow with con­fi­dence.

As a good par­ent, you pro­vide shel­ter for your child, clothe your child, feed your child with healthy and nour­ish­ing food, and it is al­so im­por­tant to pro­vide a good at­mos­phere with ex­cel­lent fa­cil­i­ties and feed your child's brain with healthy, ed­uca­tive thoughts. One must al­so be­lieve in his/her own child, in terms of the child's abil­i­ties, and it is im­por­tant to show the child that you have con­fi­dence in him/her, which will kin­dle the best in the child's in­tel­lec­tu­al pow­er to ex­ploit them to their fullest po­ten­tial. A par­ent al­ways wants what is best for the child, thus par­ents must give their best to the child. A par­ent's pos­i­tive thought-pat­terns will nur­ture the child's in­tel­li­gence.

En­cour­age your child to have a thirst for knowl­edge

A child is very sen­si­tive to the tone you use, so one must speak gen­tly in or­der to get the co-op­er­a­tion you de­sire. Have pa­tience and do not have high ex­pec­ta­tions too quick­ly, as this will cre­ate un­due stress and anx­i­ety on the child and your­self. Let your in­stincts guide you to guide your child. Knowl­edge and love (most im­por­tant) are what you should im­part on your child. You can in­crease the child's in­tel­li­gence at a very ear­ly age, the ear­li­er the bet­ter, through your at­ti­tude. If you cre­ate the right at­mos­phere (such as fun-to-learn games any­where and any­time), your child will have a love for knowl­edge and ask ques­tions through his/her own cre­ative think­ing. In­tro­duce your child to colour­ful pic­ture books, flash-cards and oral read­ing at a very ear­ly age. Adopt a fun-to-learn at­ti­tude which will de­vel­op the child's in­tel­li­gence and pro­vide the child with choic­es so he/she can con­trol his/her own des­tiny. Your child can learn with­in min­utes, hours, days, weeks or even months and it will not be your child's abil­i­ty at test here, but yours. Your pos­i­tive at­ti­tude, your be­lief in your child, your love and care, your pa­tience and your per­se­ver­ance will be tried, but you must al­low the child to feel that learn­ing is a fun-ex­pe­ri­ence.

De­vel­op­ing the child's brain at home from an ear­ly age

From the time a child is con­ceived, the child be­comes part of his/her moth­er and over the months de­vel­ops the sens­es of sound. This is why it is im­por­tant for the par­ents to speak gen­tly and to re­late to the child while it is still in the moth­er's womb. When the child is born, he/she be­gins to live in a world of the five sens­es–sight, sound, touch, taste and smell. Ini­tial­ly, the child is a pic­to­r­i­al vi­su­alis­er, look­ing at all the new faces, places, etc, then in his/her own way, the child will try to con­verse with you in ba­by sounds. Par­ents must al­ways sing, talk to the child gen­tly and touch the child in lov­ing ways as the child will even­tu­al­ly try to mim­ic what they see, hear and feel and re­spond to it ac­cord­ing­ly. The more in­ter­ac­tion there is be­tween the child and the par­ent in the ear­ly stages of life, the soon­er the child will de­vel­op his sens­es–his think­ing and speak­ing abil­i­ties, and the soon­er will the child be ready for read­ing and the thirst for knowl­edge.

Nurs­ery rhymes play an im­por­tant part in ed­u­cat­ing the child. The catchy rhythms stim­u­late the child's hear­ing and help to dis­tin­guish be­tween dif­fer­ent words. Rep­e­ti­tion gives the child con­stant prac­tice of say­ing out words aloud and, as the say­ing goes, prac­tice makes per­fect. When you en­cour­age your child to talk, you are mak­ing the child use his/her nat­ur­al abil­i­ty to hear, which will give the child a sense of achieve­ment and make him/her want to learn more, which will lead the child to read­ing.

Stim­u­lat­ing the child's brain to blos­som

Your child looks to you, as par­ents, as their role mod­els, so you have to set the child's ex­pe­ri­ences of the sens­es in the right di­rec­tion through your ac­tions and the ex­am­ples you set. What you ex­pose the child to from an ear­ly age will be a fac­tor de­ter­min­ing how your child's think­ing, be­hav­iour and re­ac­tions to sit­u­a­tions will be. How much your child en­joys read­ing is de­ter­mined by your at­ti­tude to­wards read­ing. You can help your child de­vel­op his/her lan­guage and think­ing skills at home through col­or­ful books. Read aloud for at least 15 min­utes dai­ly, prefer­ably at bed­time, whether it is nurs­ery rhymes or sto­ries. This al­so helps to build a warm and close bond with the child as you give your child full at­ten­tion dur­ing this time, shar­ing and car­ing and mak­ing the child feel a sense of se­cu­ri­ty.

Nev­er post­pone bed­time read­ing ses­sions, which the child en­joys and looks for­ward to. Sto­ries cho­sen should con­vey mes­sages of hope, love and achieve­ment. This even­tu­al­ly en­cour­ages the child to read on his/her own. The child's ex­pe­ri­ences help to de­vel­op them from an ear­ly age, so take your child on out­ings–to the park, the zoo, the gro­cery, the mall, the beach, for a pic­nic. Ex­plain things to the child and ask ques­tions to al­low him/her to think, form sen­tences and re­late his/her ex­pe­ri­ences to feel­ings. Sight­see­ing trips are a trea­sure of in­for­ma­tion and fun. Mu­sic can al­so have a pos­i­tive ef­fect on the child's de­vel­op­ment. The child tries to im­i­tate the sound which en­cour­ages him to talk and learn faster, and to ask ques­tions which are an in­te­gral part of the child's growth and search for knowl­edge.