We’re currently loving author, dad and neuroscientist John Medina, who has written an amazing book on how a baby’s brain develops, Brain Rules for Baby. Medina has portrayed the complexities of neuroscience, neurons, molecular biology, parenting, psychology and neurophysiology in a funny and witty way, all to explain how your bub’s brain is developing throughout the three trimesters. He also offers important scientifically supported advice regarding what to do and what not to do.
Top Tips
Here are some top tips from Medina to help your baby develop during pregnancy and beyond.
Tip 1
In the first trimester, baby basically wants to be left alone. So mums, put your feet up, lie down on the lounge and relax. Some researchers actually think that morning sickness is an evolutionary mechanism that the body has developed to force mothers to slow down in the early stages of pregnancy.
Tip 2
In the early stages of pregnancy babies are developing 8000 neurons per second. This is why it’s so important to listen to your body and take it easy when you need to. It is in the second half of pregnancy, when the baby’s brain is wiring the thousands and thousands of connections between neurons, that associations are formed and the senses including hearing, smell, taste and movement are all rapidly developing.
Tip 3
TV before the age of two is not only ineffective, some studies have shown that it may be counter intuitive. In fact, research has shown that every hour of TV viewed before the age of two increases the chances of attention issues and bullying in children once they start school.
Tip 4
Some kids are born on the “happy” end of the spectrum and while others are born on the “anxious” end of the spectrum. If fact, one in five kids are going to display anxious qualities. One of the key findings across a plethora of studies and spanning a multitude of cultures has shown that your child’s happiness is heavily influenced by how you as a parent deal with your own emotions, particularly the intense, reactive and sometimes inappropriate ones. Two effective strategies of dealing with these emotions include firstly labeling emotions and secondly empathising, which actually calms the nervous system.
Stay tuned for our upcoming blogs to gain more insight into the fascinating world of a baby’s brain.