azziria: (tattoo)
[personal profile] azziria
Fascinating prog on TV last night about feral children (children who have been severely neglected or raised by animals).

One thing the scientists have learnt from these children is that we have a window of opportunity as very young children to learn language. If a child isn't talked to and doesn't hear language when very young (we're talking under 3 here), they can never learn to speak. They can learn words, but will never master stringing them together to communicate, will never master grammar. The part of the brain that deals with grammar actually shrinks away and can never redevelop.

The other thing these children never really learn is how to develop appropriate personal relationships with other people. Again, the complexity of how to relate to others in the intensely social setup we humans have is something you apparently have to learn when still very very young. And if you don't get the social contact, your brain doesn't develop properly.

CAT scans of the brains of these feral children show how incredibly different they are from those of 'normal' children.

But the thing that came over most strongly to me from the programme was that the most important thing the psychiatrists etc working with these children did was touch them. Hold them, give them simple physical affection. Above everything else this seems to be what children need to develop normally.

When I think how much time I've spent (and still spend) hugging and cuddling my children (even my too-big-for-all-that-soppy-stuff 6-year-old boy) I'm so glad I've done it.

Date: 2003-12-16 10:02 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] guenhwyvar1973.livejournal.com
Wow, that's really quite amazing. It's almost scary how early we (as humans) obviously start to develop, and how important that early development is.

Wonder what the psychiatrists would say about the soggy cornflake issue though...*s*

Date: 2003-12-16 10:13 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] azziria.livejournal.com
Well, my daughter's nursery report for this term says that 'communication is her strength' - for this read 'won't shut up' (like mother like daughter), so at least I've no worries about her linguistic development!



Date: 2003-12-16 10:29 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] guenhwyvar1973.livejournal.com
ROFL

Mine used to say things like *talkative* (i.e. spends more time chatting than concentrating on work) hehehehe

Date: 2003-12-16 10:44 am (UTC)
ext_6114: (prettything)
From: [identity profile] maymorning.livejournal.com
Yes, my daughter too! On her first day at school, the headmaster asked her if she was going to talk in class as much as her mother did! (He was my teacher at the same school.) She did very well in Welsh, French and German at high school and was able to write pages and pages of essays in those languages. (Welsh is compulsary in schools in, well, Wales, until the end of GCSE.)

Date: 2003-12-16 11:32 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] eremite.livejournal.com
I used to ignore a lot of the policies against touching the children when I did my teaching practise blocks.

Little kids (and big kids) are such touchy-feely beasts and I simply could not bear to push five year olds off when they crawled onto my lap or ran up to give me a hug.

I remember taking classes on the theory of language acquisition and language learning - the difference between soaking it up as a tiny child and then trying to pound in new lexis and grammar as a teen/adult. Who was who said that learning one's first five or six languages is difficult, then it gets a lot easier (or something like that)?

Date: 2003-12-16 12:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ihlanya.livejournal.com
I simply could not bear to push five year olds off when they crawled onto my lap or ran up to give me a hug.

I've noticed this with DS's after-school club. They're very anti-touching. It's all this paedophilia and HSE stuff. I think not touching a child does a lot of harm.

Date: 2003-12-16 12:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] azziria.livejournal.com
I've a (male) friend who's an infant school teacher. He finds it so hard when the little kids come up to him in the playground and want to hug him and he's not allowed to.

And at DD's nursery we've had to sign special consent forms so that the staff can put suncream on her in the summer. I ask you!

Date: 2003-12-16 01:02 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] eremite.livejournal.com
One teacher told me that a lot of her male primary teaching colleagues ended up getting pushed into management posts with little child-contact because of constant suspicious querying from parents and other staff: "Why do you want to work with young children, eh?". Euch. Similar to the way in which little old ladies can watch kids at the park, but little old men get frowned at for doing exactly the same thing. It's madness.

The worst incident I heard came from a colleague who'd been assisting in a school where a boy in 2nd year had soiled his trousers. The secretary called his mum and asked her to come in and he was made to stand at the back of the class for twenty minutes, smelly and dirty, because none of the adults would take responsibility for taking him to the toilet and helping him to clean up a little bit of shit. That poor kid.

Date: 2003-12-16 01:10 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] azziria.livejournal.com
That's so sad, isn't it? And ridiculous too.

This friend of mine is someone I would love to have teaching my small children. And it's such a shame we don't have more men teaching the little ones - all my son's teachers are women, so except for his father and our male friends he has no real male role models. It's a very female environment.

Date: 2003-12-16 01:19 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] eremite.livejournal.com
I was really angry about it - one of those pointless rushes of rage that can't go anywhere and just make you feel sick after a bit.

I never had a male teacher until I got secondary school, then it was split about 50/50.

Actually, now that I think about it, I hardly remember any men in my early childhood. Dad and my brother, of course, but grandad died when I was 4 and everyone else was female. How odd. Maybe something to do with being in a small, traditional and conservative town - the women tended to work at home and the men worked away at the construction yard on day/night shifts.

Date: 2003-12-16 01:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ihlanya.livejournal.com
What a horrible thing for a child to have to endure. I feel the rage rising within me at the mere thought. If something like that had happened to MY child, I would have thrown such a fit at them leaving him like that.

Anyway, why couldn't they have removed him from the room quietly and discreetly?

Makes me want to throttle them. RRggg.

Date: 2003-12-16 01:41 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] eremite.livejournal.com
Yep, it should've been easy - off to the toilet, wash down with some paper towels, dry pants and trousers. Done. Happens to everyone at some time or other, nothing to worry about.

Why make such a big deal out of it? How could they have been so callous and stupid? Why were they so scared? (Or squeamish? Goddamnit, little kids are always covered in something - leave the icky feelings at the door.)

Now I'm feeling angry again! Thinking happy thoughts. La la la.

Date: 2003-12-16 01:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ihlanya.livejournal.com
*joins you* La la la laaaaa....

Date: 2003-12-16 12:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ihlanya.livejournal.com
My son was the only white kid in his whole pre-school. So he spent a few years around African kids, who are particularly touchy-feely. Even the men often hold hands and think nothing of it. Also, their concept of personal space is a lot smaller than ours.

When we emigrated to Scotland, I had to (against my human instincts) take DS one side and explain that these people were extremely reserved and didn't like people to get too close to them physically. He'd been hanging on the other kids and putting his arms around them and they'd been reacting with complete horror. It was such a shame. He couldn't understand why he had to stay away from his friends.

In some ways, I prefer the African way of doing things. :-(

Date: 2003-12-16 03:08 pm (UTC)
ext_6114: (prettything)
From: [identity profile] maymorning.livejournal.com
My daughter has a friend, a boy, who wants very much to be a primary school teacher. He'd be a good one too. He does a lot to look after his two much younger sisters and is great with young kids. It's sad to think that he'll have a more difficult job simply because he's male. I remember that back in the 60's, infants teachers were always female and junior teachers were male.

Date: 2003-12-16 03:27 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] azziria.livejournal.com
I thin that once DS gets to Juniors there are some male teachers. And at least he's getting some male input from rugby and football coaches, which is something, I guess.

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