Years ago (1983), Howard Gardner wrote a book titled, "Frames of Mind", where he outlined his theory of multiple intelligence. This theory, widely accepted today, involves breaking intelligence into like groups including: interpersonal, intrapersonal, spatial, kinesthetic, musical, logical, verbal, existential and naturalist. An easy way to think about these intelligences is a talent.
We have often heard people say, "I was just born with it" when talking about a certain talent. In the scientific world they would say "you have a dominant intelligence". While all people are born with something they are good at, that doesn't mean that other intelligences cannot be developed, in fact the more a child is exposed to when they are small, the more intelligent they can be when they are fully developed. This is the approach I ascribe to: "wholistic" learning: teaching children about anything and everything through movement, music and tactile play.
Children are very curious creatures. The way we first display their learning environment either creates a thirst to learn, or they can develop an adverse attitude toward it. "Wholistic" learning uses not only different intelligences, but also involves the whole brain. The different intelligences, they have found, are located in different parts of the brain. When you can activate more than one area of the brain at the same time you are developing literal nerve connections between those two places.
Did you know that a child's brain is the most elastic, developing the most myelination on these nerve cells before the child is 5? That mean we have a greater chance to change the future of a child in those first 5 years. Developing the ability to focus is critical in those five years and the amount of exposure they have to different situations, people and experiences, the better. Exposing them to art, music, books, dance, games, play-dough, sports, counting, memorization, drama, museums, the zoo and so many more activities is a way to build that all important "gray matter". So preschool in not just a place to get them out of your hair - it's a place they can grown mentally!
