Your Child's Growing Mind: A Practical Guide to Brain Development and Learning from Birth to Adolescence.

     Healy, J. (1994). Your child's growing mind: a practical guide to brain development and learning from birth to adolescence. New York: Doubleday.

Personal Reflection and Notes

This is an incredible book! It took me a long time to work through it, even though I was very interested and motivated to keep going. The ideas were so strong and relevant to my life as a parent and teacher that at times I just had to stop and digest it all. There were many things that I already was aware of and some that I am good at doing, however, she led me to much more thought and gave me incredible information that I can share with parents as I help them start their children in school. The notes that I took here are extensive, because I wanted to be able to come to this page and quickly find the strong ideas that were presented until I have them internalized.
This book dealt with child development, but in a way that I haven't experienced before. When I learned about child development over 10 years ago there was not all of the brain research to discuss. This book looks at development of the whole child - brain development included. It is an interesting perspective. I would imagine that there will be a revised edition of this book as more brain research comes into light.
I would definitely recommend this book to parents, especially parents who feel that their child should be pushed. There were multiple statements that supported the idea of letting a child have the gift of time and how it is necessary to give them this gift for optimal brain development.
There are comments and reflections interspersed with the notes. This is a book that I feel I will refer to often.

Part One: Brain Development and Learning
Chapter 1: Opening the "Black Box"
The brain is regarded as a black box. It has been a mystery for so long, but now brain research is exploding. However, the research is slow to make it into the circles of teachers and parents, so unfortunately they are not aware. Children learn in a unique way, different than adults. There is promising research that every child has the potential to learn. We need to recognize their individual needs and move ahead from there.
Is learning genetic or environmental? We are born with certain brain structure and chemical balances, so is learning potential hereditary or is it influenced by the environment? Actually, that debate isn't as important as how we teach children and meet their individual needs.

Chapter 2: Infancy: Creating the Foundations of Intelligence
The infant's brain is remarkable. I have reviewed brain research in several other books and don't care to here, but it is important to note that the brain has three main parts. These are also explained in Boys and Girls Learn Differently. Of course, at this stage of the learning game, parents are the key players. They should realize that their child is increasing their knowledge about the world around them and needs to be an active learner and engage the senses. Brain connections are being formed and stimulation is important.
It is interesting to note that during the fetal period rocking occurs as the mother moves about and that rocking enhances brain connections. The same is true for infants once they are born, rocking is an important form of stimulation. Isn't it amazing that females have the tendency to rock when they are around infants, who knew that instinct actually helped brain development!
A child's sensory system is critical for brain development. All of their senses are employed, but infants really absorb information through sight and hearing at first. Stimulation to the senses is how children learn about their world.

Chapter 3: Children's Brains at Work: From Nursery to Schoolroom
Young children need safe, secure environments to explore and learn in. Children's thinking is different than adults and they progress through stages. Adults can help them form a scaffold between information they know and new knowledge through language and actual experiences. Parents and caregivers are the ones to help children develop their knowledge base. Their involvement is crucial long before teachers and school enter the picture.
Preschool age children need to engage in self-organizing play activities. "Because of immaturity in parietal lobe areas that connect sight, sound, touch and body awareness, it is still difficult to combine processes from more than one modality such as in looking at a letter form and saying a sound to go with it, or hearing a numeral and writing it." (p. 49). Memorizing little bits of information will not aid in brain development. Preschoolers need experiences in patterning and sequencing. They need to experience things first hand. It is a good idea to limit TV and computer use. Young children need to play and pretend.
As children become school age, a part of their brain connects all of their senses and that makes new learning possible. Children move from the concrete to the abstract. It is good to present your child with "cognitive conflict." Challenge their thinking with questions instead of simple answers.
"Give your child the gift of patience for the broad-based mental experiences that will underlie joyous learning throughout life. Teaching specific academic skills before the levels of sensory reception and association are in place is like trying to build a large penthouse on an apartment building before the intermediate floors are complete. It may look good for a while, but eventually you're in for a collapse. Childhood is a process, not a product, and so is learning." (p. 62). This is a powerful quote.

Chapter 4: If the Train is Late, Will We Miss the Boat?: Developmental Timetables and Learning to Pay Attention
"By age six, teachers should expect a four year span in maturation among students of the same chronological age." (p. 66). For me, that means that in kindergarten I will have children from a 3 year to a 7 or 8 year range. I have read other sources that have stated the same span. I can back this up with experience as well. And not only do I have this range for 6 year olds, I also have an actual age ranges that spans as much as 18 months to 2 years. Some children enter kindergarten just as they turn 5 and others wait until they are 6 1/2 or 7.
Children who display immaturity but are academically strong do not necessarily need to be pushed - they may need time to mature in order to succeed in the classroom and avoid frustration.
A child's life experiences interact with the developmental schedule of the nervous system in these ways:  physical well-being and motor development,
social and emotional growth,
approaches toward learning,
language development,
cognition and general knowledge.
These forces can mean that a child will not be ready for school, even if they are five.
"A child who is lagging slightly in development is on the same track as the others. His train simply goes at a slower pace, although it stands every chance of reaching the same destination." p. 68. Healy offers a list of 12 factors which are red flags for a lagging timetable in children on pp. 68-69. In order for me to help these learners, I should work together with parents to develop abilities to succeed. I also need to capitalize on the child's strengths and talents and let the child move along according to their timetable. However, this isn't always realistic in a regular classroom setting.
Children do not choose to fail. We need to plan tasks that use that fact. Early learning experiences need to be appropriate, fun, interesting and successful. Healy offers advice on retention. She states "it can be an opportunity for neurological maturation to become more equal to academic demands." (p.72). Formal instruction places new demands on the growing nervous system. Healy offers these suggestions for promoting readiness at home on p. 74:
sufficient rest and nourishment to concentrate for several hours.
experience of listening, following directions and responding politely to adults.
knowledge of appropriate behavioral limits.
experience of socializing with other children.
help in obtaining and organizing school supplies.
clothing chosen because it is easy for the child to fasten alone.
help in learning to express needs and concerns.
practicing with small motor skills and moving left to right.
understanding that books are stories and have information.
physical and emotional safety.
All of these items are the parent's responsibility and are not within my control. I would like to share this list when I meet with pre-kindergarten parents in the Spring before the Fall start of kindergarten.
Brain connections cannot be pushed. Speed of processing depends on myelination, which happens with age. Pushing can even cause negative responses which we cannot reverse. Children enjoy repetition, it gives them a feeling of control and mastery. Adults need to be careful not to push their needs on children.
Attention is a hot topic among teachers and parents. "It is useless to expect mature attention patterns from a child, yet many adults have trouble understanding the real limitations that immaturity places on the ability to stay on one task - especially on that the child didn't choose." (. 79). For instance, homework or an assigned school task.
Healy offers a multitude of information regarding attention and attention deficit disorder in this chapter.
"Children must have time to do their own mental growing.... Pushing little engines up the mountain doesn't work in the long run, because there will always be higher mountains on the other side which the child must eventually tackle on his own." (p. 87.)

Chapter 5: Childhood into Adolescence: Furnishing the Adult Mind
Healy discusses children between the ages of 9 and 18 in this chapter. I skimmed the chapter because this is not an age group that affects my teaching or my classroom. She states that during this time automaticity is forming and she suggests way to strengthen this important skill for learning. Thinking is moving from the concrete to the abstract.

Part Two: Foundations of Learning
Chapter 6: "A Path to the Future": Hemispheres, Learning Styles, Handedness, and Gender Differences
Healy notes that the discussion of Part Two will move from looking at the brain from back to front and switch to looking from left to right. There are many misconceptions about brain hemispheres and new research is enlightening us to them. Healy describes what each side of the brain is stronger at and how the brain can adapt and compensate when it needs to.
Healy discusses handedness and what influences that choice. I often see children in kindergarten who have not yet made a choice, or developed a stronger hand or side. The side that children choose is connected to the opposite side of the brain and that becomes the "dominant" side. She recommends that we do not meddle with a child's tendency since it is brain driven and can lead to other difficulties if we do.
The book Boy and Girls Learn Differently is the book I choose to use in our book discussion in February 2002. Healy touches on the topic of how boys and girls are different and basically states that there are tendencies for boys and girls to show particular skills, but there is no hard evidence. She acknowledges that there are biological factors, such as hormones, that contribute to differences. However, we must consider the environment, or nurture, as well.

Chapter 7: "Do Pigs Have Wishbones?": Unfolding Language
This chapter is devoted to how language develops from infancy. Healy discusses how children are born programmed for language and their environment is important for its development. She suggests ways for parents to foster language. The mechanics of speech are important and the author touches on and supports a point that I make with parent's when I meet with them for the first time: don't use baby talk with your kindergarten age child. Healy gives fantastic lists of milestones, recommendations and warning signs. This chapter is a good resource for dealing with parents who have concerns about their child's language.

Chapter 8: Tools for Learning: Intelligence, Memory and Motivation
Oh, I can hear the echoes of Emotional Intelligence and Successful Intelligence and Standardized Minds at the beginning of this chapter. The great debate about IQ scores. The difference in this book is that it is written for and about young children and their parents, that makes it much more useful and relevant to me than the other books did. Healy does not favor intelligence testing for young children - neither do I. She wraps up intelligence by referring to Gardner and Sternberg, familiar names.
Implicit memory seems to be reinforced by using more than one sense, which makes a case for teaching the whole child and engaging multiple senses in lessons. One way that I immediately think of memory in kindergarten is learning phone numbers and addresses. These don't have a lot of meaning for the child so they are difficult to learn. However, if I include actions or music they are more likely to remember. Repeating patterns of movement builds motor memory pathways. The children need to be actively involved. Healy offers lists of suggestions for strengthening memory for different aged individuals.
Motivation is linked to emotion and driven by our brains. Challenge excites the emotional brain and that leads to motivation. A caution goes out to parents and educators not to always offer external motivators - stickers, toys, etc. This can lead to problems down the road.

Part Three: Learning Applied
Chapter 9: Children Read with their Brains
Children can learn to read very young, but unless they are connecting meaning to the words it is useless. They learn about meaning by experiencing things early in their life.
The reading lessons occur in a pattern. First, children learn that language carries a message from other people. Second, spoken words become symbols for objects and events. This ties into memorizing how a word looks or "sight" word learning. If children are unable to visually memorize and master words, then it is on to phonics instruction. The circuits in the brain are ready for phonics around age 6 or 7. So why am I teaching phonics like crazy in Kindergarten?
All children need to learn phonics since not all words can be read by sight. "Sounding out words meaningfully calls upon a relatively late-maturing area in the left hemisphere of the brain. In an important junction of sensory areas in the cortex called the angular gyrus, sound and meaning get attached to the letter shapes. This area matures early in some children, but many wait until after age six." (p. 232). "Good reading calls upon many areas of the brain working together, and a smoothly running system takes years of practice." (p. 233).
"Reading comprehension depends on frameworks of meaning from prior experience as well as on decoding words." (p. 234). When we are confronted with unfamiliar text, first we have to put it into a context that we understand, then we apply rules of grammar. Pronouncing words would be a low priority and if we get caught up on it, then meaning may be lost. And what is the point of reading if we are not looking for meaning?
Healy offers "Reading Development in a Nutshell" on pp. 236 and 237. She says that "Early childhood programs should focus on language and listening, not pencil-and-paper drills." The most important point that I can take from this to share with parents is: "the time you spend reading to your child is the best predictor of later reading success." This statement comes up often as I read from the leading authors in the literacy field.
When should children learn to read? Healy looks at this question in light of research in mental development. If we push kids too hard, too early, they are not ready and they will find reading boring and difficult. That turns them off by the time they are ready. Healy offers a list on p. 240 of facts that outline the dangers of pushing reading too early and on children who are not ready or interested. If children show that they can really read early, remember, they are still 5 or 6 and need social skills and life experiences that will continue to help them grow.
Parents play a critical role in getting their child ready to read. Read, read, read at home. In order for a child to be ready to read, they must have visual development, thinking skills and lots of language. Object manipulation and play are major foundations for good reading. Linguistic awareness is important and children will demonstrate they are ready for it and then there are simple, natural ways to introduce it.
As parents think about working with their child who is becoming an independent reader it is important to remember that comprehension is the goal, not perfection. A lot of Healy's comments mirror those that I heard at a guided reading inservice presented by an educator trained in Reading Recovery. Never criticize a child's reading, children do not make mistakes on purpose! The mistakes they make are the window we have into their minds to see what they are thinking. Instead of getting upset or anxious, stop and reflect! On pp. 255 and 256, Healy offers a list of questions to ask about reading programs. I would like to answer these and have first and second grade teachers answer them as well.
The section, "Dealing with Difficulties," contains suggestions for parents that teachers can also examine. Remember, children are not lazy. Inconsistency is a signal of a learning difficulty and a learning difficulty is no ones fault.
"A child's reading ability is truly a mirror reflecting the background of mental development and interest which he brings to it. Learning to decode the words is only part of the process; understanding and applying them for learning is what good reading is all about." (p. 260).

Chapter 10: Thinking on Paper: Writing and Spelling
Writing is a field that hasn't been given a lot of attention until recently. That is interesting, I have found many great resources and a lot of research. Our brains have separate neural circuits for different types of reading and writing. That is why some children appear good at some skills and weak at others. Healy breaks this chapter into 3 segments: handwriting, spelling and writing.
Handwriting is first. Scribble writing is an indicator of linguistic awareness. It should be encouraged because it helps create the act of linking ideas and paper. A child writing his name is the next task. Parents need to monitor their child's pencil grip and encourage a correct one. There is concern that hand exercise is lacking for some children. That is one area that I try to address through my curriculum by offering playdoh, painting and a variety of writing tools. It is important to include perceptual and analyzing skills with early attempts at handwriting. Healy points out that problems with articulation and handwriting often go together. That is because the part of the brain responsible for hand movements is very close to the one which organizes the mouth and tongue around speech. (p. 268). This is interesting since several of my students have received speech and language services.
There are two basic ways to approach spelling: visual analysis and memory and auditory analysis, or phonics. Children learn to spell mainly using sounds. This moves into sight as the brain matures. Spelling requires that we pull things from our memory with no visual clues. Rote memorization is often how spelling is taught, but it may be better to approach spelling through word families, similar chunks in a words that are used to group them into a spelling task. This however, is complex and abstract, so children may not be ready for it until the age of 7.  Phonological awareness (the ability to discriminate and order the sounds of oral language) is a fundamental skill for spelling. (p. 272). Temporary spelling is an important for five and six year olds. Adults must remember to praise, not criticize. They must teach spelling rules and word parts, but let the children experiment with them to internalize them. They must not supply spellings. This is where I run into trouble with KidWriting because they want teachers to write the adult writing on the child's work. I need to do more investigation into this. (See ACTION RESEARCH)
Thinking about writing we must recognize what is involved. According to Healy on p. 278 a writer must:
understand and pull together ideas or information
formulate an original statement
find the right words
get them in order
call up the mechanical skills while holding the ideas in working memory long enough
to get them down on paper.
There is a great list of ways to encourage children to write that I can share with parents on p. 280. In fact, this whole chapter is helpful.

Chapter 11: Parts into Wholes: Building Math and Science Skills
Math is rooted in concrete experiences. Math learning involves comprehending relationships, reasoning abstractly and solving problems. It also means following rules, analyzing and computing accurately. This is complicated! Spatial relationships are important for understanding place value, directionality, fractions, estimating and geometry. Activities such as large blocks, mechanical toys, carpentry tools, sand, clay and water play are helpful in developing these concepts. Seriation is a true precursor of counting. Understanding that one thing can be bigger than another, but smaller than a third. Math learning has three stages: concrete, symbolic and abstract. Many of the abstract concepts of math are learned through physical experience and events in daily life: equal, greater, less, more, bigger, smaller, plus, take away, multiply, divide, when, until. Sorting and classifying is a skill that can be nurtured through real life experience as well.
Counting means different things to people. Reciting numbers is referred to as counting, but actually using objects and forming and counting sets is true counting. Number actually refers to a set. Numerals refer to the printed symbols. Healy states that some children's learning styles will lead to them having difficulty with fact sets. If this is the case, then use technology. Let them move on and create their great thoughts, not get hung up on the memorization that isn't part of their style. Problem solving is much more important than getting hung up on addition or subtraction when technology is available. That is an interesting point and I wonder what upper grade teachers have to say about it. It is easy for early childhood people to say such things, but children will eventually encounter the upper grades. On pages 309-309 Healy gives great suggestions for building brains for the future: cooking, family games, shopping, travel games, collecting, exploring nature, measure and weighing, using time, following directions and calculator games. These ideas should be shared with parents.

Chapter 12: The Toolshed Muse: Creative Minds in Process
Creativity is difficult to assess. Gifted does not necessarily mean creative. We cannot force creativity and we must be careful pushing our lessons or activities on children when they are too young - they need time to explore, play, move and talk. That will foster their creativity more than formal instruction. Creativity at school can be fostered through our language and comments about a child's work and through process-oriented activities. We may not be able to teach creativity, but we can model creativity.
In conclusion, Healy states "Learning is something that children do, not something that is done to them, You have the wisdom to guide the process but not the power to control it. Listen, watch, have patience, enjoy the journey - and the product will take care of itself." (p. 331).