The implication of brain research in preparing young children to enter school ready to learn

The Florida Department of Education (DOE) indicated that twenty percent of Florida's children entering public school are identified as "not ready to learn." Many early childhood educators have said that a five-year old entering school for the first time, beginning the journey of a lifelong education, may already have missed some crucial opportunities for learning that can never be recaptured (Newman, 1997). From the standpoint of brain development, children start school relatively late in life. Long before youngsters master their ABCs, their brains have passed many developmental milestones. Yet, education policy has not addressed how children learn before they arrive at school or how parents can be helped to enrich the home environment so that their children will be ready to learn when they reach school age. The purpose of this study was to determine if young children who experienced a brain enriched learning environment prior to starting school, enter school ready to learn.;Research in brain development suggests that it is time to rethink many education policies for young children (Newman, 1997). A growing body of knowledge is shedding new light on the effects early experiences have on the development and functioning of the brain. If harnessed properly, the power of these findings could help fuel a new generation of investments in early childhood education, parenting education, and family support. The technology available today opens up opportunities to think anew about how children learn, grow, and develop.;Further, brain research has phenomenal implications for educators and policy makers. The research implies that no child is born with his or her place established on the bell-shaped curve (Miller, 1997). All children are born with the same number of brain cells. But if a child's brain isn't nourished with rich environmental stimuli as well as good nutrition, some important brain connections are not made. How a child's brain gets wired depends on what happens to that child during the critical early years. This study sought to determine if a brain rich environment before formal schooling is important and to elicit implications of these findings for policy makers. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...