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Babies' People Sense
July 1, 2010
To be accountable we must render an account:
Not what was said, but what was meant.
Not the fact, but what was felt.
What was known, even while unnamed.
-Amanda Gorman, 2020 National Youth Poet Laureate
-Amanda Gorman, 2020 National Youth Poet Laureate
To illustrate this, Galinsky described the results of a study done at Yale University in which babies are shown a puppet show where a round circle with big eyes tries to reach the top of a hill and is helped up to the top by a square but pushed down by a triangle. After a baby viewed the show, a tray with the square and the triangle was placed in front of him or her to see which one she or he reaches for. Would the six-month-old reach for the helpful shape or the unhelpful shape, or would there be no pattern. Here was what the researchers reported:
"We found impressively that almost one hundred percent of the babies in a number of different studies preferred the more helpful character."
Ellen Galinsky has captured relevant early childhood research and spelled out for parents and teachers the practical applications for raising well-rounded children who will reach their full potential in Mind in the Making: The Seven Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs. She groups this research into seven "essential life skills":- Focus and self control
- Perspective taking
- Communicating
- Making connections
- Critical thinking
- Taking on challenges
- Self-directed, engaged learning
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Comments (7)
Displaying All 7 CommentsShishu Vikash Kendra
Kolkata, West Bengal, India
The inner sense of a child is sharper than an adult . A child do have the power to identify person who is helpful or not to him/her. A child is greater
than us .
Families and Work Institute
New York, NY, United States
Thanks SO MUCH for the write up about Mind in the Making. I look forward to continuing the conversation with all of your readers.
I hope you all will have a chance to look at the book--there are so many examples of babies' amazing capacities. Your observations Tena are so right!
To Darlene:in the Hamlin experiment, the researchers of course changed not only the shapes that were helpers and hinderers, they also changed the colors (in case children prefer one color or shape versus another). The results stayed the same. What did make a difference was having eyes on the shape. When there were no eyes, the children didn't show a preference.
To Ethel, great to hear from you. The book has is doing extremely well and is in bookstores and on line (published 4/20). Thanks for all you do and hugs to you!
Ellen
the grand child care center
chicago, IL, United States
Children are way too much smarter than we can imagine! Working in child care field for almost quarter of a century I observe this all the time.
Stockton, CA, United States
I have always strongly believed this, based on observation in homes and infant centers. It's great to have some empirical bak-up.
Central Child Care
Saint Paul, Mn, United States
I read the New York Times article on the Yale experiment and the video on the papers web site It is simply amazing that babies can pick out the "good guys" from the "bad guys"
United States
Would the child pick the triangle if it were the helpful one?
Squares are more common. Maybe that is why they chose it.
retired-Parent services project
San Anselmo, CA, United States
Thanks again Ellen xo Next time you are in CA or me NYC let's have a date.Update me on your where abouts. Is the bk at bookstores-if so I'll get my copy. We cannot relax our tenacious efforts to have our nation know the way we can assist families in raising healthy, humane, empathic children The world depends on it
Hugs Ethel
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