The speech therapist spoke about the negative consequences of excessive early development of the child

In the modern world, more and more parents strive to develop their children from an early age. There are various educational classes, clubs, and some techniques promise rapid progress and intellectual growth. Natalia Abuzarova, a speech therapist and head of the Ya-Logopeda correctional centers, told Izvestia on March 27 why excessively early development can lead to negative consequences and what a baby really needs for harmonious maturation.

Each skill appears in a child at its own time in accordance with the stages of maturation of his nervous system. Parents, trying to speed up this process, sometimes artificially stimulate skills that the baby's brain is not yet ready for, the expert said. She compared this process to a staircase: if you try to jump over several steps, the structure will become unstable and may collapse.

Early learning to read is currently popular. Adults are proud that their two-year-old child learns letters. However, as noted by the speech therapist, few people think about the fact that at this age completely different processes are prioritized: emotional interaction with parents, cognition of the world through movement, sensory experience. Without these basic stages, intellectual skills can be "built up" on an unstable foundation.

According to the expert, the child does not need complicated toys and special techniques to develop fully. The best they can give him is an enriched living environment where the baby can crawl, touch, taste, explore. Sensorimotor development is the basis of subsequent intellectual growth.

Abuzarova stressed that the stage of active movement is especially important. From the moment when a child begins to crawl (about seven to eight months old), it is important for him to overcome different surfaces, not just a flat floor. If there is a staircase in the house, then it is worth letting the baby master it under supervision. Such actions contribute to the harmonious development of the brain much more than classes with an outsider adult.

The defectologist added that when a child finds himself in a developmental center, he spends energy adapting to a new space, strangers, and a group of children. The remaining energy may not be enough for him to fully assimilate new information. At the same time, at an early age, he learns better through interaction with his mother, in a familiar and comfortable environment.

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"Parents often worry that they will miss or miss something. However, it is important to understand the natural norms of a child's development and monitor their gradual development. Speech is the main indicator of development, which shows that all mental functions, such as attention, memory and thinking, are formed correctly. If a child does not have phrasal speech at the age of two, but still does not speak at the age of three, this is a serious signal for parents. In such a situation, it is important not to teach the child letters, but to urgently contact a speech therapist or neurologist," Abuzarova said.

So, at the age of six months, the child already reacts to the mother's voice, distinguishes intonations, turns his head to the sound, begins to babble. From seven to 12 months old, he understands simple requests, recognizes familiar objects and people, and utters the first meaningful words, including "mom" and "dad." From one to one and a half years old, a child can already follow complex instructions, understand stories with pictures, speak simple phrases, and know up to 20 words.

Older children, up to two years old, know 50-300 words, build sentences from two to four words, and ask questions. Kids who are even older, up to three years old, already have a vocabulary of a thousand or more words, pronounce complex sentences, and tell stories.

As the speech therapist explained, if the child has no developmental disorders, the main thing is not to rush. It is necessary to support sensorimotor development, create a diverse living environment, play with the baby, talk with him.

"Early development is not a competition. Do not try to teach your child everything as early as possible, but help him explore the world at a pace that is comfortable for him. This is the only way to ensure a happy and harmonious childhood for him," concluded Abuzarova.

Earlier, on February 13, Lola Shurygina, an expert on the opening of schools and kindergartens, the founder of the private secondary school "Makarun", said that when choosing a school or kindergarten, it is first necessary to discuss the basic criteria. In particular, it is worth considering the distance from home: preschool children should not choose institutions that are more than 15-20 minutes away from their place of residence.