You Can Raise Your Child's IQ

Experts explain how


PONDER THIS SCENARIO: As parents of children ages nine and five, you think you've done your best to help them develop their minds. You started reading to them as infants: you bought them eduational toys; you took them to the library. Now they're doing well in school. But should you be taking credit? According to some scientist, your children would have done just as well without your zealous efforts.


For example, in The Limits of Family influence, David C. Rowe maintains that parenting styles have no influence on a child's intelligence is predominantly genetic and varies according to race. In the wake of the controversy that book stirred, The Wall Street Journal published a statement signed by 52 researchers saying studies "indicate that genetics plays a bigger role than does environment in creating I.Q. differences."

After years of being told how important it was to stimulate their children's intellects,many parents have understably become confused. Are efforts to improve their kids' academic skills just time down the drain?


No, say many researchers. The American Psychological Association recently chose a task force to examline genetic versus environmental influences on intellegence. The group's report acknowledge the important roles played both genes and environment (which includes a child's health and nutrition, as well as family upbringing).


Even if genes play a dominant role, that leaves plenty of room for parents to influence the outcome. Indeed, a growing amount of research shows that, especially in the early years of life when the brain is still taking shape, parental attention---even such a simple activity as playing peekaboo---helps construct the complex brain circuitry essential to intellectual development.


"Parents need to recognize how important their input is," says Craig Ramey, professor of psychology. Ramey has spent 30 years studying how early stimulation by adults develops childhood intelligence. "We can see positive results even in very young children.


Explosive Growth


The most convincing evidence for the importance of adult influence on a child's intelligence comes from a study of "at risk" children. Ramey and Frances Campbell of the University of North Carolina worked with children born into poverty-line households. The children entered entered the study by four months of age. During the study,one group spent the day in a center where teacher used games and songs to stimulate the infants. Another group had no such program, but they were given nutrional supplements in infancy.


During preschool years the children in the early-education group showed I.Q. advantages of ten to 20 points. The highest-risk children showed the greatest gains, and at age 15 they had higher reading and math scores.


What accounts for these gains? Ramey and other scientists say early childhood experiences foster brain growth.


An infant is born with billions of brain called neurons. Some are wired to other cells before birth to regulate the basics of life, such as heartbeat and breathing. Others are waiting to be wired to help him or her intepret and respons to the outside world. Experience dictates the hookups. As the child matures, cells reach out and set up pathways to other cells needed to determine a behavior. For instance, the neurons in the eye send branches to the visual cortex, which interprets what the eye sees and, via other branches, cues the person to react to what is seen. Each time an experience is repeated, the pathways are strengthened.


The first two years of life are an explosion are an explosion of brain growth and connections. By age two brain has more than 300 trillion connections. At the same time, cells that aren't being connected or used are being discarded.


Many Opportunities.


There seems to be a timetable for this programing of the young brain---"windows of opportunity," as one neurobiologist puts it---when specific connections may be made. For instance, the neurons governing vision undergo a growth spurt in the first half-year of life and are connected to 15,000 others by eight months.



There's a similar window of opportunity for understanding language and learning to talk. A newborn has capacity to distinguish among sounds in any human language. Japanese and American infants both readily distinguished between 'r' and 'l' during the first half year of life, according to Dr. Patricia Kuhl, a cognitive neuroscientist who studies language development at the University of Washington. However, since there's no "l" sound in the Japanesse language, Japanese infants generally fail to retain the connections for that sound. As a result, a Japanese baby not exposed to the difference between "r" and "l" before age two will usually have trouble discriminating between the two sounds as an adult.


If you miss a window of opportunity, will your child be forever handicapped? No, because opportunities to strengthen brain connections abound throughout childhood. Using positron emission tomography (PET) scans, which trace glucose consumption in the brain, pediatric neurologist Harry Chugani of Children's hospital at Wayne State University in Detroit has shown that the brains of three- to ten-year-olds use twice as much energy as the brains of adults.


That, Chugani explains, is because the brain has far more connections during those early years, which makes it easier to learn new skills.


Consider, for example, the process of learning to speak a foreign language. While a kindergartner picks up an unfamiliar tongue more readily than a nine-year-old does, the nine-year-old learns it more readily than does a secondary school student or adult.


"Casual" Emphasis. What can a parent do at home to bolster a child's I.Q.? "You needn't try to teach your child in the formal sense of instruction," says Sharon Landesman Ramey, who collaborates with her husband on early-intervention projects. What's necessary is creating a stimulating atmosphere for casual learning. Start early in the child's life, these experts suggest, and follow these steps:

Look them in the eye. Your six-week-old's eyes focus at roughly seven inches---just about the distance at which you hold him or her in front of you and gaze at the face. That tracks brain connections into a pattern of recognition that's strengthened with each exposure, and helps your child sort the world into what's familiar, what isn't, what's different, what's the same---crucial skills in learning.

Talk, talk, talk. Amy Leonard talked a steady stream to her daughter from the time she was born. At three, Lizzie was speaking "in whole paragraphs," her mother says. Now almost five, Lizzie can read simple books.

Early command of language is important, says Janellen Huttenlocher, professor of psychology, because "language is important to successful intellectual functioning." A grasp of language goes beyond being able to say words. In one experiment Huttenlocher and colleagues found that the amount parents spoke to their children during the second year of life had a major effect on children's vocabulary size.

In another experiment, Huttonlocher and others tested the mathematical ability of two groups of kindergartners. One group came from deprived homes with presumably little parent involvement, the other from more educated families. In tests of calculation, when pennies were surreptitiously added or taken away from a pile, children in both social classes did equally well in determining the new number of pennies. But when the problems were stated in words---"Mary had three apples. She gave one away. How many did she have left?? " ---the more educated group did far better. 

Make room for music. In the Maultsby household, "The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round" is a bedtime favorite sung by three children and two adults. Linda has been crooning for her babies since the oldest, Sarah was born seven years ago. Even if you're no Pavarotti, your lullabies and jingles help your child's brain development.

Music does more than teach kids about rhytim and melody. Giving three-year-olds piano and group singing lessons dramatically improved their spatial-temporal reasoning, say researchers at the University of California at Irvine. In assembling puzzles, they were more accurate and faster than three-year-olds piano and group-singing lessons dramatically improved their spatial-temporal reasoning, say researchers at the University of California at Irvine. In assembling puzzles, they were more accurate and faster than than three-year-olds who had no lessons. Moreover, spatial-temporal reasoning, says physics professor Gordon Shawa, director of the ongoing California studies, is important in understanding math and science. Using a computer model, Shaw has predicted that math and music could share common neuronal firing patterns, and the prediction has been supported by follow-up observation.

Encourage exploration. A child buids intellect and learns about the world by reaching out to new experiences---by exploring. "The good news is that kids are predisposed to seek out the novel," says Craig Ramey. "You don't have to prime the pump."

Little explorers are looking for new worlds even while lying in the crib, their gaze fixed on various objects. They have boundless curiosity, which they satisfy by touching, tasting, handling and rubbing. Encourage that curiosity---in fact, explore with them. Pick up a toy and look it over, then hand it to your child to examine. Don't be afraid to get down on the floor and crawl with him.

"Label" things. Linda Maultsby used toy figures to help her three-year-old son, Michael, distinguish colors. "Show me the red toy,' I'd say," Maultsby recalls. "Now show me the green one.'"

Even babies recognize that red is different well within the first year of life. It's the parents' role to "label" different colors, sizes and shapes to reninforce such understanding.

Stand up and cheer. "Good!" you exclaim when the little one first learns to drink from a cup. Praising your child's accomplishments not only brings peals of delight from the child but also reinforces connections between the frontal cortex and the amygdala in the midbrain, the seat of emotions.

Between ten and 18 months, the brain is making these connections. When you praise Baby's first steps, making Baby happy, a flood of neutrochemicals is released in the brain, strengthening the circuits. Conversely, if Baby's achievements are repeatedly met with indifference, the circuits fail to strengthen, and Baby becomes reluctant to try new things.

Don't stop now. While early intervention is most important, intellectual development  doesn't end there. Neural networks continue to develop into the teens, especially those for emotion. Continue to read to your child, keep the conversations going, play music. Your role remains important in a young person's development as he or she matures.

Actual I.Q. scores may not change dramatically as a child grows older, but academic achievement can. These are the years in which the brain is fine-tuned, and a young person's environmental influences continue to count. Your attention won't neccesarily create an Einstein, but it remains a vital ingredient in your child's intelligence.KP4RWW7293BD                     

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