Monique Soto

May 11, 2010

Tuesday 11-1

CDE- 416

Class Application
This spring semester in my child development class I gained a wealth of knowledge that

unexpectedly opened my eyes up to new ideas. There were many activities that were

untraditional but because of this, it helped keep this new information fresh in my head. We also

learned from traditional means such as movies, handouts, lectures, and books.

In the first lecture we learned how our belief systems are all based on our experiences. It

is especially important to make a good impression on children. This will build the childs belief

system towards teachers, school, and learning. When they have a pleasant experience, it will

release pleasure chemicals leading to a positive belief system rather than a negative one. This is

important for everyone! We learned there are many ways to encourage the release of motivating

chemicals. Some of these examples are eliminating threats, giving children choices, positively

influencing students beliefs about themselves, managing childrens emotions, and providing

positive feedback. One of the most important things we can do for a child is to provide a stable

attachment which can only occur through a relationship. This will give the child the emotional

safety they need for developing healthy relationships in the future.

Something that really changed my mind on the rewards system was the handout

Punished by Rewards: A Talk with Alfie Kohn, explaining the damages and negative effects of

this type of treatment. The reason behind this is we are giving the child the mentality that by
them doing something good, they will always expect something good in return. Rather than

doing it for the right reasons. I always thought giving rewards to children was good and couldnt

cause any harm but the handout and further discussion changed my mind about the reward

system and that they are often counterproductive.

One of the things that moved me the most was the lecture about the Russian orphans and

the effects neglection can cause. The orphans had nobody to play with him or her. Nobody to

hold them, sing to them, or any type of attention towards them. Hearing about this felt inhumane,

and simply horrific. Just the scans alone showed the results of how much activity goes on in the

brain of a young child and how major the negative impacts are when a child is neglected. It can

cause a lack of emotions, a disconnection from others and ultimately harm the child in the same

ways as physical abuse.

One thing that is always difficult for me to understand and grasp is anything scientific. I

usually can never remember anything having to do with scientific concepts. One thing that I was

able to remember, was the structure of a neuron and how it works in the human brain. This is

surprising because I once answered that same question incorrectly and failed a test because of it.

When we discussed what went on with the process of how a neuron receives and transmits

information and had to work together to make a model, this helped keep the information in my

long-term memory. I got the question right on the test and can now completely describe the

process without hesitation. The reason this information is important is because it explains how

learning takes place and how 100 billion cells are involved to make connections grow. Also,

there is no way of making neurons but it is possible to make more connections.

 I also learned about all the lobes of the brain and what each one of them does. There are

four main parts: the frontal, parietal, temporal and occipital lobe. The frontal lobe is responsible

for judgment, reasoning, creativity, thinking and problem solving. The parietal lobe is the

receiving station for sensory information. The temporal lobe controls hearing, memory,

meaning, language, music and expression of emotion. The occipital lobe is responsible for

vision. Another concept grasped was that the motor cortex controls movement, while the

somatosensory cortex is the receiving area for pain and temperature. The brain does not

completely developed until about age 26 and the last lobe to develop is the frontal lobe. This is

often why teenagers act out irresponsibly, have a lack of good judgment and make poor

decisions.

One of the most important concepts we learned was how a childs environment can cause

a huge amount of good or an equally detrimental amount of harm to the brain. Technically, its

called neuroplasticity, which is the environmental change in the brain. An enriched environment

causes an increase in cell weight, branching of dendrites, more dendrites/synapses per neuron,

increased neural activity/tissue volume and greater density of capillaries/blood flow. Enrichment

involves three key items: novelty, complex/challenging experiences, and opportunities for

feedback. The dangerous outcomes of an impoverished environment are very dangerous. It not

only decreases cell weight, but it causes the possible loss of cells and even diminishes dendrites.

In a classroom its hard to teach certain concepts to students when you dont have their

attention and many teachers have no idea how to even get it. In our classroom we learned what is

necessary to gain a childs attention. To do that, you need to engage all of the senses, connect the

information to something they already know (such as a previous experience or create a new
experience) and an emotional hook. If a student has no idea what you are talking about they will

disengage, they need to make sense of it all. There is a learning process that takes place, which is

when the students senses focus on the information, then they determine if the information is

meaningful with an emotional hook, therefore the stimulation of cell neurotransmitters is

produced, finally a repeated activation synapse strengthens which means the information has

stayed in the long term memory. One simple major way to impede this process is if stress or

threat is added to the equation.

One of the most interesting lectures was the discussion of how different moods, emotions

and atmospheres could affect our brain. The main section of the brain responsible for our

emotions is the prefrontal lobes. Our emotional state has a powerful impact on the attention of

our working memory. Less space is available to process information if a person is anxious, angry

or upset. It was explained that when drinking your brain can only pay conscious attention to only

one train of thought at a time, which is pretty much always true, this is called the Cocktail Effect.

One of my favorite group activities was when we got separated into groups and had to

come up with different ways to provide a stress free environment. We thought time limits,

talking down and demanding children were all negative behaviors. We also thought some things

that would positively create a stress free environment is by talking to children like a person,

giving them more options, letting them speak about what is on their mind, and positive

encouragement. We then talked about some reasons why a child may feel threatened in school

and came up with: pop quizzes, bullying, social dynamics and the pressure to perform well. Not

only did we determine that children feel threatened but also that teachers may feel threatened by
policy, loss of jobs, and parental pressure.

One of the topics that were often brought up was how children need to be more active

and have more exercise. Many children are wired to the computer or watching television for

hours rather than going outside and playing, it is a bad habit and is one of the major leading

factors to child obesity. The education system isnt doing much by taking away time for recess,

and physical education programs. There were many articles that were given out that proves

statistically how important it is for children to have exercise, for example in the article Exercise

Improves Kids Academics, it shows how poor are children are performing and how obesity is

on the climb, research shows a direct link connected between fitness and academics.

Dr. Perry wrote an amazing book I read called The Boy Who was Raised as a Dog, this

is why I was so interested in the movie he was in. It covered specific important topics in the

book, which were truly moving. Perry had an important message to deliver which was basically

to increase the awareness of the effects of childhood trauma. Bruce said that positive

experiences lead to better communication skills, and to form healthy relationships. No part of

the brain can change without stimulation. The faster we recognize a problem the faster we can

make a change which is important because the more time goes by without help the harder it is to

reverse the effects in the future.

One thing that helped me out was writing the LTDs for the books we were reading, it

always helped refreshed my memory. The book Magic Trees of the Mind explained how

important an enriched environment is and that the brain can grow! Diamond conducted an

experiment comparing rats and how their brains are affected in an enriched environment (big
cage, toys switched daily, with other rats) and an impoverished environment (small cage, no

toys, alone) and found that the rats in the enriched environment had a thicker cerebral cortex then

the rats in an impoverished environment. In Jensens book we learned about multiple topics, such

as how much an unborn child is influenced by his mother, and why teenagers act a certain way.

I learned a lot from all the information thrown at me this semester. The one thing I really

want to do with all this information is to share it with others because I feel like most of this

information is important to know, and if everybody knew this it could make a difference. The

main difference I want is to make a better environment for children because that could make a

worlds difference, it may seem simple which means it is only that much easier to achieve this

goal.