An interesting article about 'Art and Confidence' from BBC.
ART
AND CONFIDENCE
BBC
iWonder - Can
art and craft make children more confident?
by
Alex Winters
Extract
from BBC iWonder - www.bbc.co.uk/guides/z8k487h
Making
new brain connections
Did
you know that being creative and making things could affect the
physical –
as
well as emotional and psychological – way the brain develops?
When
babies are born their brains have almost the full complement of
neurons
already
in place but only about one quarter of the connections between them
(synapses)
have been made. Babies and children go on to make millions more of
these
connections
throughout their early childhood as they start to make sense of the
world.
The
most fruitful time for making new connections in the brain (a process
known as
‘synaptogenesis’)
is during the first three years of children’s lives and research
has
shown
that being in creative environments at this age can really fire up
these new
synaptic
connections.
Giving
children the opportunity to be creative when they’re very small can
therefore
help
them to connect all the different parts of their brains and their
bodies, build a
well-rounded
personality and promote mental wellbeing – as well as honing
physical
connections
such as the fine motor skills they’ll need for activities like
writing later on.
