Dr

Dr. Fritz M= engert

NeuroCognitive Application Protocols

Confronting the World with an Adaptive Brain:

Coming to Know and To Be Known<= /i>

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Keynote Add= ress given at the ECMMA Conference

Kennesaw State University=

© Augu= st 1, 2003

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The brain of a one year old child is alive with the organization and reorganization of neural cells that are dispatched for the purposes of adaptation of the organism. The process is frenetic and resemb= les a mid-summer electrical storm. = Much of this activity is stimulated by a rapidly growing sensory system that is refined as it takes shape. Th= is brain organization is a complex, highly individualized process that sets a foundation for taking the brain to more elaborate organizations and interactions. Eventually the = brain will walk, talk, reason, and survive threats of all sorts from the environm= ent in which it lives.

Three of the most crucial skills to emerge out of the frenetic early stages of organization are the development= of a self, served by language, and supported by the ability to reason. Basic organizational brain structu= res that will please adults, interact with other children and ultimately talk, laugh, dance, cry, discover and know “when to do or not do” are forming. But does this just h= appen without tutoring? Does the br= ain just switch on with systems just doing what they do and BANG! we have a child? Well yes, the blueprin= t is there in the infant’s DNA and even with the appearance of all the seemingly chaotic activity there is an order that is pre-coded. Again, it is much more complex tha= n easy description will allow. There= are codes that are preset by years of selective fittings, yet there are nuances= and subtle differences that remodel the codes enough to produce an array of very different children based on an age-old formula.

Even our scientific language is hardly elastic enough to describe the differences that parents, grandparents and casual observers take for granted. Research data is accumulating to suggest that the genetically preset codes are modified by the environment from which the child comes. These modifications can, of course= , be positive or negative---helpful or disabling---but the life that surrounds t= he organizing brain is critical to how and what it becomes.<= /p>

Beginning with John Dewey’s wor= k in the early twentieth century, educators began to sense the importance of an organized direction for the developing brain. It was clear to Dewey and his coll= eagues that there were indeed patterns in the growth and development of the young child. It seemed reasonable t= hat these patterns could be accelerated or slowed by the shape of the environment. A semi-scientific field of study emerged out of Dewey’s work called Child Growth and Development.&= nbsp; The content of the studies were general, based on observation and psychological predictions, with the addition of what was then known about t= he physiological development of young children. Allied fields and studies supporti= ng Growth and Development data expand= ed and, perhaps for the first time in history, educators began to treat the li= fe of the young child with significance. In same time period in Europe, Ma= dam Montessori’s work was underway and Jimmy Hymes was writing important child development books for American parents. The work of Rousseau and Pestalozzi began to be given a second look by Child Development specialists. Courses in Children’s Litera= ture, Child Psychology, and Child-Centered Art, Music and Dance gained in profess= ional popularity and the so-called preschool education was finding a home in the American school.

A hundred years later, there is little argument about the importance of education for young children. In the stream of American pragmatic consciousness, however, there is greater emphasis in the educational patter= ns on getting children institutionally “ready” for what is to come than there is for making contributions to the individual development as it = is in the present. With the floo= d of data flowing from studies conducted during the Decade of the Brain there is sound reason to suspect that early childhood experiences may shape many of the skills and attitudes essential = for determining the quality and character of a child’s life. That is not to imply that the R= 20;die of life is cast” at ages three or four, but it does suggest that ther= e is much more to the “die” than just getting the child ready for kindergarten or first grade.

Musical Moments, Rhythmic Movement, a= nd Poetic Language

Several paragraphs back mention was m= ade of the nearly chaotic activity of cellular placement and displacement going= on in the very young child’s brain.&nbs= p; The infant’s brain is constantly reorganizing to meet the stimulation from the sensory system the pre-coded standards of “norma= l” brain development. The physic= al activity of the young child seems at times to emulate that brain activity.<= span style=3D'mso-spacerun:yes'> Early walking is uncertain, crawli= ng is often aimless, and early sound production is indiscernible. Yet, there are patterns that can be distinguished with careful observation and eventually these patterns emerge= and what was once erratic becomes quite regular and smooth. The same is true with brain patterns. They seem to move f= rom chaos to organization “naturally”.

Why, one might ask, is there urgency = for rectification and the finding of patterns? The answer is far from clear. In any way the question is asked, = the answer is very complex. If one takes Marion Milner’s position found in On Not Being Able To Paint (1950), you may argue that there is an inborn need for responding to what she calls the inner voice that keeps tel= ling us that we need to conform to what is already known. One can deduce from her discussion= that the human brain reproduces the environment in order to make sense of the wo= rld. Her position is that the human bra= in seeks to make the unrecognizable familiar or that out of scribbles come identifiable patterns. Milner’s work is not earth shattering but it does have a uniqu= e, artistic flavor to it. To ext= end her argument, it is possible to assert that the young child---while living a rather disorderly life---is in search of order. Eventually, s/he will discover that order through his/her own early life experience and then will reproduce it throughout life. Teachers of = young children may want to read Milner if for no other reason than a sense of reassurance that the child will in fact find order.

I recall once walking into a kinderga= rten classroom and being confronted by a girl who was painting at the easel. “What do you think that is?&= #8221; she said pointing to large brush stroke of paint on the easel. “You tell me what it is,R= 21; I replied. “I don’t= know yet,” she said, “but I thought maybe you would see it.” <= o:p>

Steven Pinker asserts that the brain comes to language instinctively and that there is a developmental stage when language happens. That stage = is directly related to the child becoming ambulatory and so it is probably cor= rect to hold that walking and talking occur in the same moment of brain developm= ent. It is not that easy as there are environmental factors that are in the formula and those factors are indeed significant and interesting. = It is appropriate to wonder whether a child would walk or talk at all were they n= ot in a culture that walked and talked. In spite of all the cellular organization and activity it is not cle= ar that they would. It is not too difficult to suggest that having the capacity to walk or talk does not necessarily mean that a child will do it.&= nbsp; If we return to the thesis that one of the primary drives of the bra= in is to adapt, then asking the question “adapt to what and how?” = is essential. Language is an adaptation as is movement, so that might need to be considered in thinking about those brain skills. Even without becoming too involved in anthropological speculation it is possible= to observe that walking and talking appear to be fundamental functions of the developing brain.

Now it is time to admit that there is language and then there is language. The early spoken language of the young child is devoid of conceptual analysis, innuendo, and metaphor. It is overpopulated by nouns and directed toward identification activity. Then---very early o= n, that language shifts to verb activation with linkages between subject and predicate. All of this follow= s the design of the brain enhanced and, some would argue, fashioned by the environment. Specific cells a= nd cell groups are “in” the brain as they acquire language and tho= se cells are susceptible to environmental modification. Built into any of the human langua= ges are emotional triggers that come into being soon after language acquisition. With the use of language, emotional activities emerge.&nbs= p; The ongoing act of acquisition and application of language is parall= eled by the consequences of language use and uniqueness in experience. Young children are often tutored a= s to what things are called, how to identify people, what words are taboo, and t= he order and emphasis in word patterns. This is externally instructional and for the brain it is an act of reorganization. Adults often = say, “you never know what children are likely to say.” This is a reference to the fact th= at they have not learned what not to say.

It is my epistemological position that language precedes thought. Th= at position can be extended to suggest that language is thought. Language is the critical link among people and perhaps the most important link in all civilization. It is said best in Genesis XI,

And the whole earth was one language, and one speech. And it came to pass as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there…And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose = top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abro= ad upon the face of the whole earth. And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the chil= dren of men built. And the Lord sa= id, “Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this = they began to do; and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us= go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. So th= e Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of the earth; and they left= off to build the city. Therefore = is the name of it called Babel; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth.=

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The Tower of Babel is related to the concept of language and that concept continues to underwr= ite nearly all human exchanges today. The brain, as an adaptive skill, seeks to communicate with its socia= l/civil environment. Human communicat= ion is premised on movement from the subtlety of a raised eyebrow to the Sufi̵= 7;s prayerful whirling-dervish; and on innuendo that extends to the sarcasm of = Mark Twain and the passionate words of love written by Shakespeare. This whole world of language and movement has to be taught to the young child when the brain is particularly receptive to the thrill of language acquisition. It has been suggested that the acquisitional process is limited after the age of ten. This is not true; however, the you= ng brain is highly responsive to teaching patterned for language acquisition.<= span style=3D'mso-spacerun:yes'> In fact, the brain is always learn= ing and seeking to add to what is known. To some extent, developmental stages for learning are overdrawn. There is good science that shows t= here is no better time in the emergence of the educated person than early childh= ood to attend to language development, use, and experience. But wait, there is more! The whole of human experience is punctuated with stories, narratives that require interpretation, and moment= s of substantial agreement that propel our civil lives. There are hundreds, maybe thousand= s of icons of thought that are open for unique interpretation; some of which can= be publicly shared, and some we prefer to possess as our own.

Just as the brain is designed to hear, interpret, and produce language, it is also able to perceive actual motion = and to identify suggestions of motion in stable art and photographs. The cortex is heavily populated by receptor cells that congregate in receptor fields specified to bring motion= to consciousness through the sensory system.&= nbsp; This complex brain function is taken for granted by adults as they h= ave had years of experience of motion. For the young child the experience of motion has to be balanced with= the experience of moving through space with the observation of movement of space itself. There is a wonderful description of area V5---the primary receptor field---in Inner Vision: An Exploration of Art and the Brain (Zeki, 1999) written by the world’s foremost authority on the relationship of neuroscience and aesthetics. Zeki explains the anatomy of area = V5 but he also discusses how we are able to see movement that is not moving in representational art. These functional connections of the brain are among the most complex of the entire brain produced by the interdependent working of memory, sight, imagination,= and language systems simultaneously.

Young children come slowly to the understanding, but once there is a balance of the receptor field with senso= ry input it is difficult not “to see” those relationships.<= span style=3D'mso-spacerun:yes'> You may have had experience with a reversion to the baseline of this concept while sitting in your car in an automatic carwash. Could you distinguish whether your vehicle was moving or if the washing device was in motion? This misperception is= the result of a “dysfunction” of the vestibular system that keeps t= rack of our body in relationship to space and announces to other lobes of the br= ain “where” your body is at all times. Young children enjoy spinning abou= t in space and feeling dizzy, even falling down, with great glee. All such childlike activities help= to focus the vestibular system and the receptor fields so that motion is perce= ived in relation to an individual body. Movement, specifically dancing, is not only an important tool for teaching and refining these experiences but they also offer opportunities f= or linking a steady beat to physical motion (Promislow, 1999). There are much more sophisticated = linkages as well. Putting together rhy= thmic movement, music, and story is perhaps the most basic of all perceptual brain functions. Tribal teaching, n= early all religions of the world, and simplistic childhood games share these wonderful media for learning and coming to know. These experiences are so powerful = that adults often remember their childhood games of 50 years or longer later into their lives.

Dancing that tells the stories that t= he culture does not want told are always taboo until sufficient time has passed for the movements to have frequent enough repetitions that they become comm= on in that culture. The music and gyrations of Elvis Presley are such as example. A full body image of his movements= was censored on television broadcasts in his youth; but at his death, an indust= ry had developed based on what he did with his hips and his music.<= /span>

There is little doubt that when the Athenian Greeks spoke of Basic Education they were speaking of Art, Music, Dance, Imaginative Poetry and Literature.&= nbsp; Geometry was understood as an art rather than a science. All of the activities that we know= today as a balm for the brain of the young child were in fact experiences of c= ore learning in ancient Greece. Plato in his Republic cauti= oned us to be wary of poets and musicians as they could easily corrupt the moral= s of the youth because of the power of the arts.

Yet there is one other brain function that must be added to the appropriate education of the contemporary young child. Art, music, dance, and= the manipulation of language in poetry and dramatic play, are indeed on the cus= p of what stimulates the developing brain. Together, they produce imaginative opportunities that begin as fanci= ful delights and evolve into the ability come to know the unknown. Imagination is a potent human trai= t that we share with no other species. It enables us to experience a world known only to us. It is the ability that creates individuals, propels us beyond the restraints of our own corpus, brings us great pleasure from the printed page, and may only hint at what we can make real.

Imagination is a brain product that Jennifer McMahon, professor of philosophy at The University of Adelaide in = Australia, says “makes it all worthwhile”.&nbs= p; Despots always try to fuel the fires of hate and mistrust by capturi= ng the imaginations of the people. Censorship is always directed at containing imagination and limiting individualism. Interestingly, children have an abundance of imagination at the ready and are disposed to = use it at all times. All of us can recall a time from childhood when an adult demanded of us to tell them what= we were thinking or to stop giving them a particular look, or to wipe “that” smile off our faces.&nb= sp; This is/was an authentic clash of imaginations; our imagining and th= em imagining what we were imagining. It is repeated in schools everyday.

The imagination of the young child is fertile ground for learning of the self and world and there are no better grounds for that learning than the arts.&n= bsp; All subject matter begins in art, music, dance, and dramatic play. Even the most strident neuroscient= ist now defines awareness as feeling the world, not just being awake in it.&nbs= p; Every teacher of young children should know that the young brain, in= its haste to be organized in and for the world, first wants to move in such a w= ay that it can feel. We are eage= r to hear stories that make us feel. We love the way some music makes us feel; we love to move in ways that make us feel; and we love to feel our hopes and dreams and even our sorrows.

The circuitries of our brains are DNA ready to take on the world through our aesthetic selves. When the brain is involved in emot= ional sensing it is at peak performance. Creativity is enhanced when there are opportunities to form and refo= rm either matter or experience. A wonderful description of how all of this cortical activity comes to a point= of predispositioning in the human brain is found in chapter three of Liars, Lovers, and Heroes. This whimsical and smart book is written by Steven Quartz and Terrence Sejnowski. They call this cha= pter, “How to make a Human.” It is a truly exciting experience in print.

The brain of the young child remains a mystery in large part. So many functions are rooted in the first couple years of life that in the 1990s otherwise cautious scientists overstated how critical those years were in t= he development of a child. There= were suggestions that if certain things were not learned in those times in the development of the brain they could not be recovered. Now there is less exaggeration abo= ut the developments in the young brain but greater respect for the dynamic process= of brain organization. The early= years are critical; however, the best work of teaching is not for getting the bra= in ready for something else. The= early years are critical for the child aged two, three, or four in coming to experience the world of a child of that age. Where the pragmatic school systems around us want to have intelligence defined as information in the “ba= nk of knowledge,” the young brain wants to sing, dance, imagine, hope, taste, and stroke the world. = It seems certain that the aesthetic brain evolves into a brain that can be in = the world as the god Janus was---by looking two directions at once; one directi= on toward knowing and the other toward feeling.

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= &nb= sp; = &nb= sp; References

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