Playful Interactions that boost kids' brains
A lot has been said about kids and parenting in so many blogs. In today’s newsletter post, we’ll focus on a very specific playful interaction called ‘Serve and Return Interactions’.
Simply put, the best thing you can do as a parent or a caregiver to a child is to constantly engage in the game of serve and return with your child and understand how they respond to different cues.
You can serve with a playful sound to a baby and the baby will return a smile or a giggle and you can serve another sound back and forth and so on! During this time, important neurons in the child’s brain are firing and the child is making meaning of the world around them in subtle ways!
“Serve and return interactions shape brain architecture. When an infant or young child babbles, gestures, or cries, and an adult responds appropriately with eye contact, words, or a hug, neural connections are built and strengthened in the child’s brain that support the development of communication and social skills. Much like a lively game of tennis, volleyball, or Ping-Pong, this back-and-forth is both fun and capacity-building. When caregivers are sensitive and responsive to a young child’s signals and needs, they provide an environment rich in serve and return experiences.”
As kids grow up they can start serving adults with cues through actions or games and as an adult all you have to do is to return and enter a healthy serve and return interaction!
If this is confusing, just take 5 minutes and watch this mini masterclass from UNICEF & Harvard.
Or read more from
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/resources/5-steps-for-brain-building-serve-and-return/
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/serve-and-return/
A special shoutout to one of our readers Nithasha who responded to last time’s ask for interesting reads in education and compiling a beautiful resource. Thank you Nithasha for your support and encouragement!
Here is an excerpt I loved:
“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing.” Annie Dillard (1989) Mesoamerican peoples speak of themselves as children of corn, Somos hijos del maiz, crediting their very existence to this plant. Centuries of co-evolution. Corn the cornerstone. Histories intertwined, biologies supporting each other, becoming who they are. Molecules combining to give energy, new form, life. Are we children of wheat? Oats? Potatoes? If we thought of ourselves this way, would we remember what keeps us alive? Would we grow these plants in our schoolyards? Tend to them as family, teach through their harvest, cook and eat, nourish? If we could see the molecules all around us interacting with our skin, changing in our stomach, becoming us, would we remember?
The full link with references is below.
In Memory of Ecology - To read more, click on this link and request access!
Prasanth