to think that babies grow up automatically..

[seeker]

...and many parents waste huge amounts of time, energy, tears and stress and make themselves very unhappy trying to teach them to do things that they will do naturally because that's what they are programmed to do?

Yanbu-I've been that parent, stressing about my toddler's development, and have since calmed down as I realised he was going to do it all, just in his own time! Things are much more fun now (and I don't obsessively talk to mums about development, which alsO helps!!)

Dh thinks as a parent you facilitate their development, but you can't force it. Provide enough stimulation and enjoyment in learning and they will achieve their own potential. I agree with him :)

Had an interesting neurobiology lecture the other day. Apparently brains are programmer to develop in certain stages and the child will seek out the stimulation it needs for those stages to happen. Makes competitive parenting even more pointless!

Agree, Seeker.

Worse, society, marketing etc encourages parents to believe that they can and should 'speed up' development - and makes them feel like failures when their baby doesn't comply.

Baby Einstein...argh!! Einstein himself did just fine without it!!

Seeker - just realised that's two threads in a row I've agreed with you. Not stalking you, honest!

Ah but baby Einstein was a god send and ensured I was able to get make up on and hair straightened important work done around the house as ds giggled at a red crab popping up and down the screen to Mozart for the occasional twenty minutes.

A life saver for me at the time but I have to point out that ds is showing no signs of genius. Yesterday I caught him trying to sledge down a grass bank in a deck chair

Scroobious - and I was going to talk about marketing, and the "pathologizing' of baby/childcare in my OP but decided to save it for later!

There are lots of people who are making loads of money out of telling parents that they are doing it wrong and they should be doing it "this" way. Then when it doesn't work, parents blame themselves, not the 'expert"!

Seeker, what sort of things do you mean?

Not if they are neglected though

Our friends have a lovely boy who was originally the son of drug addicts and he is developmentally behind where he should be (by some margin)

So it's not all automatic iyswim

Agree with foxinsocks, just think of the orphans in Romania. I have been learning this week about brain development and how a baby is born with 200 billion brain cells and has lost 80 billion by the first year. A baby's early experiences will connect the brain cells and give the baby the ability to think, reflect etc. These connections are dependent on positive nurturing which release the chemicals, like amygdala, that make the connections. The development of the brain of a baby directly affects the behaviour of that baby as a child and an adult.
So, I think YABU because, although nature plays a crucial role, the role of nurture is equally important.

I have been learning about attachment theory for an essay this week and I think it's incredible how much of life is dependent on the very early years. But I suppose what it is saying is they just need love and natural interaction and everything else follows. But children who don't get that interaction will suffer. So it will be automatic with the right parenting at the very beginning, maybe?

I don't think you're being entirely unreasonable if you're talking about hot-housing in pursuit of a gifted child. But, in general, why is it that children from deprived backgrounds are more likely to be developmentally behind their wealthier peers by the time they start school? Unless the argument is that 'all children in lower socio-economic groups are just a bit thick anyway'... which would be silly... we'd have to assume that something important is missing from these children's lives. And that something appears to be fairly basic mental stimulation.

I need to correct my post amygdala is a part of the brain not a chemical, the chemical is GABA. I had to sit through a 51 slide powerpoint, no wonder I was confused.

I suppose a child will seek out stimulation of the right kind but then the quality and quantity it receives has an effect on the development.

The orphans in Romania are a fascinating example of how they would try to provide for themselves what wasn't there. The developmental effects of not receiving affection and stimulation are huge for them.

I wasn't suggesting raising them in a bubble or completly ignoring them - sorry, I didn't make myself clear. Obviously you have to teach them things that aren't normal animal behaviour, like reading and the rules of cribbage. I'm talking about normal mammal stuff, like eating and sleeping and not peeing in the cave.

and wling and talking.

Yanbu. I reckon it's around 49% innate, 49% copying/interacting with routine parental behaviours and ~2% parenting 'technique' of the kind pushed heavily in baby books.

I really tend to agree. Good parenting isn't about doing it a particular way, it's about not being abusive and neglectful.

I dislike the professionalization of parenting, with som many "experts" (many of whom don't have any children, let alone broad experience bring up lots. Especially since much of it seems to be about putting parents in a position where they are less likely to be able to respond to their children well because they've spent so much time, money, energy and self-confidence trying to follow some pointless "method".

Agree with suchprospects. I think most parents know instinctivly what is best for their babies. It's all the differing advice that confuses them.

YANBU
They need love and to have their needs met responsively.
I was quite when ds future nursery showed me their curriculum, just let them play how they choose ffs.

DS's nursery do have a curriculum, but it is based around responding to the developmental stage they have reached. So they will recognise he is in the squidging everything stage and make sure they provide things for him to squidge. Forcing them to squidge before they are ready would be pointless.

I read an interesting book when DD was very small, called 'How Babies Think' - it was all about the understanding that has been reached in child development/psychology over the last 30 odd years. It was really interesting in many ways.

One of the most reassuring things in there was this whole thing about 'stimulation'. Basically, the idea about babies needing stimulation to develop their brains is based on studies of baby rats. Some baby rats were kept in dark boxes with nothing to do. Some were given a natural rat environment to be in. The ones who were kept in a box did not develop as well as the ones who weren't. This led people to argue that babies have to be stimulated to develop. The key part of this is that if baby rats/ humans suffer sensory deprivation then they don't develop. Put them in a normal environment - not one full of extra stuff, just normal surroundings like your house, with you in it - then they develop as well as they possibly can do as they get all the stimulation they need.

So unless you are keeping your baby in a box, he/she will be fine. And they also said that doing stuff like playing Mozart to them in the womb makes bugger all difference - they will learn everything they need to anyway because they are programmed to do it :)

Do people still read Deborah Jackson?

I do see what you are saying but its not that straightforward as apparently lots of reception children start school without sufficient language skills.