Do not push your children too early in life

By Donya Betancourt

SANUR, BALI (JP): One of the biggest challenges for parents is knowing when they are doing enough for their children. But sometimes they do too much in the hope of giving their children a head start in life.

I had a consultation with a young mother and her son who was complaining of recurrent stomach pains. I examined the boy, who was five years old. His physical signs were normal. I began asking his mother about the family situation, with questions about changes in the home or possible causes for stress.

Her reply was that all was normal and that her son had been following the same routine for the last couple of years. What exactly was his routine? Since the age of three, he has been getting up at about 6:30 a.m. to catch the bus to school. He then would return home at about 5 p.m., and attend private classes -- piano, swimming and computer -- three times per week. She also was planning to put him in a language class twice a week.

And the boy was beginning to show signs of peptic ulcer.

A situation like this raises a couple of questions, like when should children start school, and how can we help develop their intellect.

In the past, it was widely believed that brain or gray matter development was dependent on the genetic makeup of the child -- either the child was born above average, average or below average -- and there was nothing parents could do. Over the last few decades, studies of child brain development have shown that parents can help in the development of their child's intellect.

It has to do with neurons (cells in nervous tissues) and how these cells multiply with stimulus. However, neuron development can be stunted if there is too much stress. Children are born with limits; we can give them a football while they are still in the crib but that does not mean they will be Renaldo. Piano lessons do not guarantee a Mozart.

Studies have shown that the most effective stimulus is love and acceptance in combination with intellectual stimulus -- which brings us to the best age for school. It is a proven fact that children will have gained approximately 80 percent of all their skills by the age of five years. Of course, this stands to reason because this is when the child learns to speak and identify with the world around him.

But it has also been proven that children who start higher levels of math at six years of age have no long-term advantage over children who begin studying higher levels of math at age 12. This is when the gray matter factor applies -- either the child has the capacity to learn or he/she does not.

There is a large body of knowledge that believes the best stimulation is not by cramming dry, sterile and dull information into the child but in the stimulation of the child's abstract imagination. This abstract stimulation can be achieved with finger painting, trips to the zoo, long walks in the park, or playing in a sand box in the garden.

It is my belief that the more quality time children have with their parents, the more likely the child's brain development will reach peak levels. My recommendation to all parents of young children is to trust yourself to be the best teacher. Embrace these early years as the gift that they are meant to be and smother your child with love and acceptance. Allow them the time to be children, they can wait until they are five before plunging into the school regimen.

The writer is a pediatrician based in Sanur, Bali. If you have questions, please contact her at drdonya@hotmail.com, or you can reach her at features@thejakartapost.com.