Do you believe what I said on the Internet that "it is difficult for ordinary families to train children who can be admitted to Tsinghua Peking University, because there is an insurmountable gap in reality, such as family background, parents' education, IQ, school district and so on"?
Still believe that children's grades are determined by IQ and self-discipline, and it is difficult to change?
After reading the book "Parents' Words: 30 million words to shape a stronger learning brain", I learned the concept of "30 million words gap", and I had an epiphany.
It turns out that we seriously overestimated the so-called hard-core conditions such as "family background, parents' education, IQ" and ignored the importance of communicating with children before the age of 3.
The famous concept of "30 million words gap" comes from a long-term follow-up study conducted by American scholars Betty Hart and Todd R. Risley in Kansas in 1980s.
Before discussing this research, let me introduce a concept: socio-economic status (SES). SES is a comprehensive measure of family income, education, occupation and other factors.
In this study, 42 families were recruited and children were followed up for 7-9 months. Each family was followed for at least two and a half years until the child was 36 months old. Every month, researchers shoot 1 hour video of the family to record the interaction between children and parents. Among these 42 families, 13 families come from high socioeconomic status background, 10 families come from middle socioeconomic status background, 13 families come from low socioeconomic status background, and 6 families come from families receiving relief.
The study found that the differences between children occurred before they were 3 years old, not after they started school. These differences come from the huge vocabulary learning results produced by parents and children in their daily parent-child interaction experience.
In high SES families, the average number of words that parents communicate with their children per hour is 2 153, and the children's vocabulary is1116. In low SES families, these two numbers are 6 16 and 525.
That is to say, children from high SES families, at least compared with children from low SES families, "heard" 30 million more words before the age of four (52 weeks a year), which is the source of the famous "30 million vocabulary gap".
Although children with good families have larger vocabularies than children with poor families, it is not the school district and other family factors, but that these families with good families have more free time to spend with their children, interact with them and "communicate". Families with poor families are busy with their livelihood, have no time to take care of their children, and patiently communicate with them.
The "30 million vocabulary gap" has caused great repercussions in the United States and the world. For a long time, researchers have tried to deeply understand the development differences of children from different family backgrounds. R's research provides a key entry point: the difference is not achieved overnight, but comes from the accumulation of children's daily life experience from birth.
The so-called "the devil hides in the details", H &；; R's research reminds people that every day, every hour, every sentence and even every word should pay attention to the interaction and communication between parents and children, because it is this most basic communication unit that constitutes and constructs the building of children's learning experience. Unfortunately, this has also caused a huge and irreparable gap in the development of children from different backgrounds.
The research team found that it is not difficult to improve the vocabulary of 4-year-old children in a short time, but it is difficult for children from low SES to "accelerate" their learning. Even if children make progress, it is almost impossible to maintain the "speed" of this progress. In primary school, the vocabulary progress of children with low SES who are intervened by kindergarten will disappear, let alone junior high school and senior high school. In other words, it is difficult to change the "development track" of children's vocabulary learning.
Carazo and her book tell a warm story: Carazo, a little girl, sleeps less than 2 hours a day because of chromosome defects, and her development is slow. By the time she was 3 years old, the doctor diagnosed her as "mentally and physically retarded" and suggested that Carazo's parents send her to a special institution.
Carazo's parents refused because they started reading stories to Carazo when she was four months old. When she was nine months old, they found that her daughter had a positive reaction to some stories. Carazo's parents read 14 books to their daughter every day since she was 3 years old. The miracle finally happened. At the age of five, Carazo was tested again, and his intellectual development level exceeded the average level of ordinary children.
This story appears in various versions of Jim Trellis's reading manual, reminding parents that in the critical period of language development, expanding children's vocabulary, reading stories to them and chatting with them can completely achieve an excellent child.
02
It turns out that the human brain is the only organ that is still plastic after birth, especially before the age of 3. Before the age of three, the brain will develop to a maturity of about 80%. What are the conditions for establishing neural connections in the brain in these three years? It is language, especially the daily dialogue between parents and children.
Each of us is born with 1000 billion neuron potentials, which can be converted into many different potentials. However, these neurons need critical nerve-like connections, just as countless independent telephone booths need connecting wires.
The magical function of parents' language is far more than a simple vocabulary introduction. It is a necessary stimulating factor to determine the advantages and durability of a specific neuronal circuit and to prune other neuronal circuits.
The more neurons connected in the brain, the smarter the child, the stronger his learning ability and the better his academic performance.
Judging from the vocabulary and the way parents talk to their children, parents' language will have a far-reaching impact on children's mathematical ability, spatial reasoning, their own behavioral constraints and moral quality.
(1) Girls are not born bad at math.
When watching the recorded video, the researchers found that some children only heard four words about mathematics at the same time, while others heard more than 250 words related to mathematics. After a year's accumulation, the vocabulary gap of these children listening to mathematics is as high as 654.38+ 10,000.
In the subsequent math proficiency test, children who heard more math vocabulary undoubtedly performed better.
This is not because they are smarter, but because of the vocabulary they are exposed to. Through language, the extraordinary ability of the brain will be transformed into a broader and more complex understanding and other abilities than the language actually conveys, helping children lay the foundation for future study.
A study on mothers found that daughters under the age of two received half as much math discussion as sons, and one-third as much discussion on basic figures as boys. The mother has always overestimated her son's math ability and underestimated her daughter's math ability. Therefore, they are more inclined to let their sons participate in mathematics activities, thus increasing their participation and interest in mathematics. Another study with primary school teachers as samples shows that women will pass on their anxiety about mathematics to girls.
In short, it is the prejudice of society and parents that causes girls to learn math worse than boys.
In fact, there is no need to receive deliberate and profound training. Simple number input by parents has the magic power to improve children's mathematical ability.
For example, when dressing, you can say "one button, two buttons, three buttons ..."; When you go up the steps, you can count, one step, two steps and three steps. ...
Life is full of numbers, which are the best materials to enlighten children in mathematics.
(2) Cultivate children's growth thinking
"Growth thinking mode" is to help children form the concept that "hard work is the key factor to achieve success, but lack of ability and cleverness are not the reasons for failure, but giving up is".
It is found that children who are often praised by the process before the age of three are more likely to have a growth-oriented thinking mode. With this mode of thinking, it helps children to resist the risk of self-stereotype that seriously affects their academic performance, so that they are not afraid of self-challenge and make greater progress.
People who think they are naturally "smart" are more likely to give up when faced with something that can't be done, because they are "not smart enough", or the matter is not important, or someone is behind it. Professor Dwek said: "If praise is not used correctly, it will become a negative force, an anesthetic that makes students negative and dependent on other people's opinions." This is what parents need to be alert to.
(3) the establishment of moral values
Wharton Business School's most popular successful course points out that people who are kind, dedicated and don't expect anything in return will not only get the best praise, but also have a thriving career. In other words, "good people get what they deserve" is actually based on disciplines.
The language of parents has a great influence on children's personality.
When children do something wrong, parents should say "you did a very bad thing" instead of "you are so bad". This can make them understand that they are "kind" and only make a mistake that can be redeemed, instead of making them feel negative and bad.
This is the power of parents' language and the power of being born in a family.
I heard a story about coming from a family: a mother was very depressed. Because her son was very disobedient, she went to consult Master Xingyun.
Master Xing Yun asked, "Have you ever copied documents?" Mother replied, "Photocopying."
Master Xing Yun asked, "There are typos in the photocopy. Do you want to change the photocopy or the original?"
Mom replied, "Of course, change the manuscript."
Master Xing Yun said, "That's right. The children's problems are all' photocopied' from their parents. "
So, you are the child's family of origin.