In this article, by Mayumi Adachi, there is a lot of emphasis on how to socialize children to music and what our largest role in this is. Adachi set up an observational study in a preschool classroom to demonstrate children’s involvement in music. We know that in preschoolers, child led play is very important as they are learning to demonstrate independence and find their own being in this new world, but Adachi found that within music, it is helpful to have some form of formal instruction. With children having instructions with music, they are able to develop their cognitive skills by beginning to understand what music is about. They can start to pick up on melody and patterns that they can hear rather than just understanding patterns that they see. Music is a way to connect adults and children because melody and tune are universal characteristics that we can observe regardless of age and understanding. By teaching children about these factors and truly facilitating an understanding of music, we can form a new bond and help create a new level of understanding within a young child and their environment.  

     Adachi, in their conclusion, proposes other questions to continue this study and find differences within the findings. They ask how cultural influences would affect this study, how parents’ temperament and sensitivities to new things could influence the findings, and if where the study has taken place would change the findings? Overall, Adachi touches on the impact of music on children’s lives and how we, as adults, can help guide them through these new findings. A great reading for people interested on the connections between music and development! 

 

If you want to read more, click here! 

Jenna Coplon  

UConn KIDS Research Assistant 

     In this Ted Talk by fourth grader Gwen Coffey, she explains her point of view as a kid feeling “micromanaged” by adults around her. She brings up creative points about how kids are always being told no rather than being taught how to do things safely. She says she can’t run on the playground to play tag, and she feels rushed to eat her lunch and is told to be quiet. She relates to adults who feel micromanaged by their bosses, and claims that she, as an explorative kid, feels micromanaged at school, a place she believes to be about learning to become more independent. She refers to overprotective parenting and says it doesn’t seem like the worst thing ever, but it can lead to children being more anxious and less independent. Her argument is that parents, teachers, and anyone else who works with kids should teach children thoroughly and not just dismiss their curiosity because of safety.  

     Gwen describes how her parents have let her just be a kid. Exploring her world safely is how she has learned to be more self-sufficient. She says she can use a drill at home and has even learned how to use a blowtorch; she didn’t just discover these things, instead her parents guided her through ways to explore safely. Overall, Gwen Coffey makes simple points to imprint on adults why children need to be able to learn and make mistakes to grow into independent human beings. The idea of letting kids just be kids is a common theme throughout her Ted Talk, which is important for adults who work with or have children to keep in the forefront of their mind when helping these kids grow! 

 

To watch this Ted Talk, click here! 

Jenna Coplon  

UConn KIDS Research Assistant 

 

The answer to last weeks trivia question, “An infant’s brain is 25% of its adult weight at birth, how much of its adult weight is the brain by age 3?”

Is…90%!!

This weeks trivia question is:

At what age do most children begin to use two-word sentences?

A. 9 months

B. 1 year

C.  2 years

D. 3 years

Come back next week to find out the correct answer!

     This article emphasizes how important it is to keep families at the center of care in nursing/medical situations. Any sort of medical scenario for a child brings up a lot of stress for the child and for the family, there are so many unknowns and possibilities that we tend to spiral. This article talks about the importance of including families in medical care practices in order to decrease this anxiety and help the whole group feel more at ease. Because a child’s family is usually a constant in their life, having their family be near in such an unfamiliar situation helps the child also stay calmer. When the parents and the child are able to stay calm and collected, this helps the medical professionals provide the best care possible.  

     The article also builds on how parents know their kid best, so it is vital to have them work closely with the medical professionals giving their child care. Additionally, when the family is involved and able to give the medical professionals information that they would not know from running medical tests, this helps the medical professionals provide better care for their patient. While the nurses have to juggle many patients and many different tests, it helps to have the family be supportive and helpful. Overall, this article emphasizes how important it is to have a strong, supportive family system during any sort of medical care. It is vital to the child’s overall care that the parents and medical staff work as a healthcare team to ensure exceptional care! 

 

If you want to read more, click here! 

Jenna Coplon  

UConn KIDS Research Assistant 

     In this article written as a master’s thesis by Courtney Lincoln, they go on to describe the differences in emotional regulation ability in children that come from different home lives and have different levels of care. Lincoln explains that children who are raised by single mothers and children who were receiving extra attention through a Head Start program had a better ability to regulate their emotions. On the contrary, children who were raised with a married mother or were not receiving attention from a program like Head Start had a harder time regulating their emotions and this was because of less attentiveness by the mother to understand her child’s emotional needs.  

     Lincoln goes on to discuss the main emotional regulation that children struggled with: emotional lability. Emotional Lability is characterized by unstable and sudden mood changes. For example, if a kid were to be enjoying a game but quickly gets very frustrated when something does not go their way, this would be emotional lability or a labile mood. Lincoln addressed this as an issue revolving around mothers’ abilities to help their child regulate their emotions. Showing a correlation between mother-child interactions and the emotional awareness that their children have.  

     Overall, this article dives deeper into how attentiveness and recognition of emotions play into how children interact with other children and adults. If parents are not encouraging work on emotional regulation, and helping their young children work through big feelings, their child will have a harder time recognizing these problems and finding ways to solve them. Parenthood is about guiding your child through this world they now must navigate and, especially when they get to school age, they need to be well prepared to understand themselves and the world around them. Lincoln does a great job of describing the key points of this study and elaborating even more on the impact of parental interactions on kids’ emotional regulation.  

 

To read more, click here! 

Jenna Coplon  

UConn KIDS Research Assistant  

Jenna is a junior Allied Health Science major with minors in Human Development & Family Science and Molecular and Cell Biology! She is on a pre-med track, and plans to go to medical school and become a Pediatrician! On campus she is involved in the UConn Dance Company, HuskyTHON, and the Pre-Med Society. Additionally, she works at the child development labs with infants, toddlers, and preschoolers!

Jenna is so excited for this opportunity with UConn KIDS to be a research assistant and we are excited to have her!

Welcome back to Trivia Tuesday!

This week’s question is: How developed is a child’s brain by age 5?

A. 75% developed 
B. 90% developed
C. 45% developed
D. 60% developed

Tune in next week to find out the answer to this week’s question!

In this Ted Talk by Rúben Martins Da Costa, he explains how children are born curious. Using a quote saying, “Every kid starts out as a natural born scientist, and then we beat it out of them,” by Carl Sogan. He goes on to explain that kids have this innate curiosity but in grade school this curiosity in minimized by encouraging formulas and memorization rather than imagination. He explains that in recent discussion people have claimed that parents and teachers should model scientific inquiry to help children learn that it is good to make a hypothesis, test it, and sometimes be wrong. But, Rúben Martins Da Costa thinks that scientists themselves can be responsible for shaping the minds of young children by including interaction moments and by connecting with the children. 

Rúben Martins Da Costa then goes on to give fascinating personal anecdotes about his interactions with children in scientific manners. He also brings up an interesting project where children are responsible, with the help of a mentor, to review scientific articles to make them more digestible for an adolescent ages 8-15. By doing this, the researcher gets a new piece of published work that is accessible for children, and the children learn the scientific review process and now have a piece of scientific information to read and learn from. 

All in all, Rúben Martins Da Costa talk about the innate curiosity of kids, and elaborates on how to harness that curiosity and not dismiss it. He gives personal anecdotes and legit studies that have done exactly this to inspire others to include kids in scientific review. A great Ted Talk to listen to, and a great initiative to help bring kids into the world of research and help them flourish within their curious minds!

If you want to watch this Ted Talk click here!

Jenna Coplon

UConn KIDS, Research Assistant