Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/fostering-grit/5024816/
Life’s early lessons are the powerful and lasting ones. While we grow and evolve throughout our lives—university programs, online courses, and travel opportunities designed for senior citizens are quite the rage—we know that children are incredibly receptive to learning during their early years of life. They observe, explore and absorb. Their brains are receptive, malleable, and growing, and that means that these early years are times for us to expose, cultivate and frame.
Writing in “Psychology Today,”Art Markman says, “The more that parents speak to their infants and in front of their infants, the better infants get at understanding speech and learning words.” This is also the case for learning foreign languages, as noted by Professor Patricia Kuhl in an article from the University of Washington: “Science indicates that babies’ brains are the best learning machines ever created, and that infants’ learning is time-sensitive. Their brains will never be better at learning a second language than they are between 0 and 3 years of age.”
The potential to make leaps in learning at a young age isn’t limited to language skills. Jim Eade, American chess master, says that children can begin learning chess at five years of age, ...