Wiring our children’s brains for success is a race against time! The early years of childhood are easy. They are eager to learn to see, walk, talk, eat, play, run, and all the other things they do. Our children want to grow up. But, once our children reach adolescence, they think they are adults and become demotivated.
Most teens and parents don’t know that another wave of growth is about to occur. This growth spurt is not easily seen because it takes place in our adolescent’s prefrontal cortex in their mental and emotional capacity, not in their physicality, as if they were growing taller. Mental and emotional capacity developed through critical thinking is something our teens will need to learn if they ever hope to become anything other than taller than their parents.
During this all-important stage of growth, our children go through another flourishing period in which their mind and body create more connections than they are actually going to use. He does this in case they decide to become geniuses, or something… You know… now that they’ve got the whole see, eat, run and jump thing.
When these newly formed connections are used, they connect as abilities that they can use for the rest of their lives. However, when these connections are not used, our teens lose these connections in a process called pruning. For our children to become productive adults with strong critical thinking skills and a mature, fully developed prefrontal cortex, they must connect these new connections by practicing critical thinking during adolescence. This is where parents come in. We can’t solve all their problems, we have to make them do some of the heavy lifting here.
Now, as my grandfather always said, “Go learn, lead, and pave the way to a better world for all of us.” Parents, now you know a few things that most parents don’t. Share these things with your children and other parents. And once again parents, thank you in advance for all you do and will do…