In Boosting Brain Power, Jill Stamm described the discovery of mirror neurons:
"These neurons have a unique characteristic in that they fire, or activate, both when a person simply observes someone else carrying out an action and when the person actually carries out an action himself. This discovery that there are brain regions that activate during both observed and performed actions is the beginning of understanding how and why imitation is one of the main ways that humans learn from each other...
"This helps explain how someone can learn by just watching a teacher, a parent, or another child do an activity. We imitate what we see. Our mirror neurons have shortened our learning curve."
Boosting Brain Power
52 Ways to Use What Science Tells Us
If the timing is right, the learning that occurs in the first five years can be a gold mine, promoting valuable cognitive and physical development that lasts a lifetime. Boosting Brain Power provides 52 strategies - one for every week of the year - to help teachers stimulate healthy brain growth in young children. In addition to well-researched strategies, each snippet of information offers teachers evidence-based instructions for how to bring the concepts to life in the classroom.
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Displaying 1 CommentBethesda, MD, United States
It's not only actions that are mirrored. Marco Iacoboni, in his book, Mirroring People, points out that the neural mechanism for empathy is that of mirroring emotions and senses, as well as actions. Sometimes, when our guards are down, we mirror thoughts as well. Especially in the process of infant attachment, but also with young children generally, the caregivers' emotions, senses and thoughts matter as much as her or his actions.
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