• Question: how do babys learn so fast

    Asked by cheese2000 to Kate, Mark U, Tess, Yue on 1 May 2012.
    • Photo: Yue Zheng

      Yue Zheng answered on 1 May 2012:

      Hello!!The brain development during early life is amazingly fast, all the little brain cells (neurons) are connected with each other in the first year of the childhood. Development of this network allows the baby to allow new things quickly and form memories of what they have learnt. As we age, we are still learning things, but many are built on what you have already known, hence, the learning process is not as impressive as when we were babies;)

    • Photo: Kate Davies

      Kate Davies answered on 3 May 2012:

      So babies are quite deceiving to us as they do seem to pick up a lot, and as you put it seem to learn so quickly. The difference is actually not so big when you look at it. As babies our brain develops at a very fast rate it will continue to do so for the most of their first 2 years of life. The difference between a baby and the older human being is life experience. As a baby the brain acts like a sponge each new experience is a life event and memories and the beginnings of motor programmes, which is part of the learning process (if you choose to do PE you will learn some more about this), their formation allows the baby the chance to very quickly replicate it.
      The first time a baby then speaks, crawls or walks it is a hugh event especially to the parents. They will continue to use experience to develop and it will seem like they are leaning very quickly, where as it is very similar to what we are doing as older humans by building upon already formed motor programmes and re programming, it is just less obvious and impressive when we are 22 months than 22 years!!!!!

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