In our attempts to prepare our children for life’s challenges, advance their experiences and begin the journey of education, life has become more complex and stressful for our little people.

Because fathers are busy working and have less down time, it is often thought the best way to spend time with young children is through organized events such as gym classes, music, swimming, dance, sport etc. However, what children want and need the most is time spent playing and interacting with their parents and fathers are no exception. We are creating stressed children who really want to do simple things and do them over and over again!

It’s really going back to old values and more simple ways. Family picnics, a walk in the bush and climbing trees are things children do less of. More in favour are computer games, automated toys and the like. Don’t you remember making stilts out of tin cans and balancing gingerly on them as you walked from one end of your drive to the next? Making cool contraptions out of cardboard boxes and string? Walking and balancing along your neighbours high fence and balancing on the cracks on the footpath as you walked to the park? These experiences don’t cost anything but time…something we have less of in our busy world. And yet these are the experiences that mould and shape our children, encourage them to have confidence to try and feel good about themselves.

How children grow their brains is through experience and doing. The more a task is practiced, the more learned it becomes. The task then becomes automated because it has been practiced so many times. Understanding this concept is most important as the brain allows us to do more than one automated activity at once, but only one thinking task. For instance, a child who is asked to cut out the picture and stick it on the paper will often ask after completing the cutting task, “What do I do now?” The cutting is the thinking task as he hasn’t had enough practice cutting for it to become automatic. He therefore forgets what the next part of the task is! He is not being naughty; he simply can only do one thinking task at a time! How a thinking task becomes automated is through practice! So, the next time your child says “again” know that this is helping to learn the task. The more I do it, the closer I come to understanding.

In our bubble wrap society, where we try desperately to keep children safe (for some very valid reasons), over protecting our young children by taking the challenge out of their play, lowering testing play equipment because its too high, and doing more things for them ourselves because it is easier, quicker and they might make a mess, is not allowing children to learn and have the experience. Through practice, children learn techniques of how to do things safely. It becomes a problem solving activity and when achieved induces great self satisfaction and growth in self esteem. Being an active caregiver or parent and providing support, suggestions and praise is helping your child to enjoy the experience and grow his brain.

This poem says it all…

Author Unknown

Written by Gill Connell – child development consultant, teacher and co-author of Moving to Learn – Crowe/Connell. www.movingsmart.co.nz and www.movingtolearn.com.

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