The Development of Your Child’s Frontal Lobe – The Control center of the brain

When can my child genuinely say, “I am sorry”
When can my child genuinely say, “please”
When can my child genuinely say, ‘thank you’
When can my child understand what happens if I do X?
When can my child stop and discern an action ?
When can my child understand consequences ?
When can my child sit still ?
When can my child feel empathy for another person or animal?

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These are all some of the capacities of the frontal lobe’s executive functions in the cognitive higher brain that plays a key role in:

• Responding sensitively to other people and to read their emotional and social cues required to help a child know when to say “I am sorry”  “please”  “thank you”

• Ability to think, plan, reflect and make choices.
• Effective management of strong feeling
• Inhibiting primitive impulses of fight-flight and freeze
• Inhibiting “motoric impulses” – our urges to run, jump, and climb.
• Problem-solving
• Self-awareness
• Kindness, empathy and concern
• Delay gratification
• Creativity and imagination

 
MRI scans shows that only at 21 years of age is the frontal lobe area of the higher brain (neo-cortex) mostly matured to allow top-down brain pathways to be developed to override lower brain functions.  However you as parents can positively impact the connections from the lower infant immature survival brain to the frontal lobes of a child’s brain  as early on as the birth of your child.

I will present FOUR ways that you as parents can be proactive in helping your child make those very vital connections to their brain’s control center.

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