The Whole-Brain Child

🔗Connect

🔼Topic:: Education (MOC)

✒️ Note-Making

💡Clarify

🔈 Summary of main ideas

1. Emotional stability precedes learning - threats or logic won't work during an emotional storm. First calm them down through connection and affection
2. Be a role model - act the way you preach. Not just with your behavior, but also your thought processes, be transparent and explain to your children what you think or why you did those things.
3. Engage your child's thinking - ask questions, let them make decisions, pose hypotheticals scenarios and ask what would they have done
4. Edit the narrative - Children often have a hard time to create a healthy narrative around the events of their life. By helping them retell it, and engaging their memories, the will be able to be better have a sense of what has happened and to enrich their emotional language.
5. Promote self awareness - by focusing your child's attention towards the SIFT (sensations, images, feelings, thoughts) that they are experiencing and helping them describe and deal with them, the child will have a better sense of self awareness and control.

🗒️Relate

⛓ by following this method, what will happen? What is the goal of this book? We would be better parents that educate towards an integrated mind, which is a child that is both aware and uses all of the different parts of the mind, the emotional, the rational, the creative, and the social one. We would use everyday situations as opportunities for educating and growth, rather than just a day-to-day survival.

🔍Critique

✅ relevant research, metaphors or examples that helps to convey the argument

1. Connect and redirect - In situations of overflow of emotions, talking logically won't help. Be there emotionally, connect with words and with body language. Accept and allow them to express their emotions. Only after the situation quiets down you can talk logically.
2. Engage don't enrage - instead of giving threats and ultimatums to the child that might push him over the edge. Use his upper brain to find a win win situation. Ask him "convince me" or "come up with a solution" or "how would that be possible" so that it triggers his creativity skills instead of an emotional breakout
3. Name it to tame it - To help integrate the left and right side of the brain, and reduce emotional floods, we can help the child align the narrative of what happened. This will give them the understanding and control of what happened they are lacking. Go with them step by step of what happened, let them tell the story as much as possible.
4. Sift checkup - help your child learn how to express themselves with sensations, images feelings and thoughts. What do you feel? what do you imagine "in your head"? how your body feels? what are you thinking? This could improve mindfulness and emotional resilience, by understanding to detect their emotions and be aware that they are fleeting.

❌ the logical jumps, holes or simply cases where it is wrong...

🧱 Implementations and limitations of it are...

🗨️Review

💭 my opinions on the book, the writers style... wow, i never expected a book to be so influential even when we are still not parents. The message is clear, direct, easy to understand and filled with examples that are relevant not only for children but for adults as well.

🖼️Outline

📒 Notes

Introduction - Survive and Thrive

Every interaction with your child is an opportunity to learn and grow, especially the "survival" moments - an argument, sitting over homework, the moments we are just trying to get by, those are the teachable moments, where are virtues are put to the test, and we can use this experience for learning Post Traumatic Growth

Survive and Thrive

• Take a moment and ask yourself: What do you really want for your children? What qualities do you hope they develop and take into their adult lives? (Location 65)
• the moments you are just trying to survive are actually opportunities to help your child thrive. (Location 76)
• What’s great about this survive-and-thrive approach is that you don’t have to try to carve out special time to help your children thrive. You can use all of the interactions you share—the stressful, angry ones as well as the miraculous, adorable ones—as opportunities to help them become the responsible, caring, capable people you want them to be. (Location 91)
• Rather than trying to shelter our children from life’s inevitable difficulties, we can help them integrate those experiences into their understanding (Location 118)

Parenting with the Brain in Mind

Cases of tantrums, meltdowns and such are examples of disintegration, which are situations where different parts of the Human Brain work separately. What we want to create is integration, harmony and connection between all the different parts of the brain, using the "whole brain approach". harmonious self

The first step for this method is to avoid falling into Distractions. When something bad happens, don't do the "let's go get ice cream", but rather help the child adjust the Narratives of what happened. like "yes it was sad that you lost your toy, didn't it?" This examples connect between the emotion (right side of the brain) to the facts of what happened (left side of the brain). This is called horizontal integration. Vertical integration is when we combine feelings of survival with higher values. Maslows pyramid

Due to brains Neuroplasticity, the more we use and create experiences to connect between different parts of the brain, the more capable, Emotional Resilience and peaceful your child will grow.

This state of peacefulness can be compared to sailing in the river of tranquility, when chaos and rigidity are the banks from each side. Chaos is full out tantrums, and rigidity is "non negotiable situation" like not be willing to get dressed or share the toys.

Parenting with the Brain in Mind

• the brain pretty much determines who we are and what we do. And since the brain itself is significantly shaped by the experiences we offer as parents, knowing about the way the brain changes in response to our parenting can help us to nurture a stronger, more resilient child. (Location 169)
• The problem with the “let’s go get some ice cream” approach is that it leaves the child confused about what happened and why. He is still full of big and scary emotions, but he isn’t allowed (or helped) to deal with them in an effective way. (Location 190)
• It’s almost as if your brain has multiple personalities—some rational, some irrational; some reflective, some reactive. No wonder we can seem like different people at different times! The key to thriving is to help these parts work well together—to integrate them. (Location 213)
• the brain is actually “plastic,” or moldable. This means that the brain physically changes throughout the course of our lives, not just in childhood, as we had previously assumed. What molds our brain? Experience. (Location 230)
• This wire-and-rewire process is what integration is all about: giving our children experiences to create connections between different parts of the brain. (Location 254)
• by using everyday moments, you can influence how well your child’s brain grows toward integration. First, you can develop the diverse elements of your child’s brain by offering opportunities to exercise them. Second, you can facilitate integration so that the separate parts become better connected and work together in powerful ways. (Location 279)
• Harmony emerges from integration. Chaos and rigidity arise when integration is blocked. (Location 309)

Two Brains Are Better than One

The brain is largely divided into two sides. The left is logical, linear, linguistic and the right is nonverbal, emotional, communicative. We need both to avoid being an emotional flood (no left brain) or emotional desert (no right brain). It's like swimming, without both hands we would just swim in circles

When either side of the brain is imbalanced, we lose perspective.

What can we do when we have emotional flood? Connect and redirect - giving logical responses wouldn't work because the emotions overwhelm the situation. First we need to calm down, and that's through Relationships, an attunement Resonance, an emotional response. Don't forget to include non verbal cues such as a smile and a touch. non verbal communication For example, in a tantrum of "you never do nice things" the answer is not to list all the things, but rather say "I do care for you, so much, you are important for me", and once the emotions quite down, you can talk logically

name it to tame it - Naming To help integrate the left and right side of the brain, and reduce emotional floods, we can help the child align the narrative of what happened. This will give them the understanding and control of what happened they are lacking. Go with them step by step of what happened, let them tell the story as much as possible supporting independence, focus on the positive moments, when you took care of them, or when they did something good. Only later you can discuss what could have been done better. Acknowledge their emotions along the way, don't skip over the "scary part"

Two Brains Are Better Than One

• while the left brain is logical, linguistic, and literal, the right brain is emotional, nonverbal, experiential, and autobiographical—and (Location 361)
• In terms of development, very young children are right-hemisphere dominant, especially during their first three years. (Location 366)
• We don’t want our children to hurt. But we also want them to do more than simply get through their difficult times; we want them to face their troubles and grow from them. (Location 417)
• by understanding how your child’s brain works, you can create cooperation much more quickly and often with far less drama. (Location 464)
• when a child is upset, logic often won’t work until we have responded to the right brain’s emotional needs. (Location 474)
• logic isn’t our primary vehicle for bringing some sort of sanity to the conversation. (Location 484)
• no matter how nonsensical and frustrating our child’s feelings may seem to us, they are real and important to our child. It’s vital that we treat them as such in our response. (Location 485)
• it’s generally a good idea to discuss misbehavior and its consequences after the child has calmed down, (Location 504)
• One of the best ways to promote this type of integration is to help retell the story of the frightening or painful experience. (Location 515)
• Children are much more apt to share and talk while building something, playing cards, or riding in the car than when you sit down and look them right in the face and ask them to open up. (Location 531)
• Healing from a difficult experience emerges when the left side works with the right to tell our life stories. (Location 537)
• When we help our children name their pain and their fears, we help them tame them. (Location 602)
• One of the best ways to promote integration in our children is to become better integrated ourselves. (Location 625)

Building the Staircase of the Mind

A second important "combo" of the mind is the vertical integration between the higher and lower parts of the brain. The "upstairs" System 2 is our high-level thinking. It's the prefrontal cortex that deals with decision making, moral behavior, etc. The "downstairs" System 1 is the primal part that deals with our most basic needs.

We need the integration because just have the primal part is obviously bad, but so does only the upper part. Decision making without being connected to our emotions, our sensory experience, can cause inhuman robotic like behavior. Morality is both rational and emotional

The problems with integration for children are:

1. Their upper part is not fully developed (and won't be developed until mid twenties), so there's not much to integrate
2. The amygdala which is in charge of "fight of flight" responses has the ability to override any other process, which blocks the pathway "up"

Accordingly, we can differentiate between two types of tantrums.

1. Upstairs tantrum - when the child decides to throw a tantrum because they want to manipulate us. The answer is to not give in, don't negotiate. Declare your Boundaries and the consequences of this unacceptable behavior, and most importantly - follow through on these promises.
2. Downstairs tantrum the child is in a fit of rage, unable to control himself. Boundaries won't do any good because the child isn't in a state to listen. Therefore, the strategy should be similar to connect and redirect. First sooth his emotions, and only later appeal to the logical side.

Tactics: Engage, don't enrage - instead of giving threats and ultimatums to the child that might push him over the edge. Use his upper brain to find a win win situations. Ask him "convince me" or "come up with a solution" or "how would that be possible" so that it triggers his creativity skills instead of an emotional breakout. Open ended questions Reverse Thinking

Besides engaging the upper brain, we can proactively train it using:

1. Letting the child make decisions - as much as possible. For example, an allowance is great for letting the child manage his own priorities and making difficult choices. Avoid intervening and rescuing. The goal is not perfect decisions, but rather training the decision making muscle Dont Jump to the Rescue developing capabilities
2. Calmness - train them to calm themselves using a count to ten or taking it out on a pillow.
3. Self awareness - ask them introspection questions, like "what calms you when you are angry?" "What made you choose this decision"
4. Empathy - be drawing their attention to other people's emotions, they can learn to be compassionate. Empathy
5. Morality - test their sense of morality through hypothetical questions Simulations, like "what would you do if there was a dollar on the street and no one was looking?" Don't forget to be a role model for them for this behavior.

Physical activity is also a good method of relaxing our lower part and restore integration.

Building the Staircase of the Mind

• A child whose upstairs brain is properly functioning will demonstrate some of the most important characteristics of a mature and healthy human being. (Location 678)
• the first reason kids often aren’t very good at using the higher and lower parts of the brain together: their upstairs brain is still developing. (Location 706)
• not only is the upstairs brain under construction, but even the part of it that can function becomes inaccessible during moments of high emotion or stress. (Location 729)
• It’s unrealistic to expect them always to be rational, regulate their emotions, make good decisions, think before acting, and be empathetic—all of the things a developed upstairs brain helps them do. They can demonstrate some of these qualities to varying degrees much of the time, depending on their age. But for the most part, kids just don’t have the biological skill set to do so all the time. (Location 748)
• A parent who recognizes an upstairs tantrum is left with one clear response: never negotiate with a terrorist. An upstairs tantrum calls for firm boundaries and a clear discussion about appropriate and inappropriate behavior. (Location 769)
• If you refuse to give in to upstairs tantrums—regardless of the age of your child—you’ll stop seeing them on a regular basis. Since upstairs tantrums are intentional, children will stop returning to that particular strategy when they learn that it’s ineffective—and often even leads to negative results. (Location 776)
• what’s most important is that you help soothe him and steer him away from the chaos bank of the river. There’s no sense in talking about consequences or appropriate behavior. He simply can’t process any of that information when he’s in the middle of his downstairs tantrum, (Location 792)
• Every time we say “Convince me” or “Come up with a solution that works for both of us,” we give our kids the chance to practice problem solving and decision making. We help them consider appropriate behaviors and consequences, and we help them think about what another person feels and wants. All because we found a way to engage the upstairs, instead of enraging the downstairs. (Location 867)
• as often as possible, we need to give them practice at making decisions for themselves. (Location 879)
• An allowance is another terrific way to give older kids practice at dealing with difficult dilemmas. (Location 887)
• avoid solving and resist rescuing, even when they make minor mistakes or not-so-great choices. (Location 889)
• Simply by drawing your child’s attention to other people’s emotions during everyday encounters, you can open up whole new levels of compassion within them and exercise their upstairs brain. (Location 918)
• When kids can make sound decisions while controlling themselves and working from empathy and self-understanding, they will develop a robust and active sense of morality, (Location 924)
• The examples you set, for good and for bad, will significantly impact the way your child’s upstairs brain develops. (Location 933)
• when we change our physical state—through movement or relaxation, for example—we can change our emotional state. (Location 952)

Kill the Butterflies

We have two misconceptions about memory:

1. Memory is like a filing cabinet - this is wrong because memory is not "stored somewhere" as it is "regenerated" Rewriting. The generation is through association, we fire up the neurons that are connected to what we are trying to remember. I.e neurons that fire together are wired together.
2. Memory is accurate - this is wrong because in every recollection we reprocess the memory based on the context and our emotions. For example, seeing a picture of a friend will generate different distortions of a shared memory depending whether they are still our friend or not.

An important distinction is that memories can be either implicit or explicit. Implicit memories can be considered as our habits or subconscious. When we are affected in the present by past events and not even realizing it. like Pavlovian dogs, or PTSD, it happens automatically because we are primed for it. Explicit memories are when we consciously try to recollect a memory. This distinction is critical because when our child is experiencing anger or fear, it might be caused by implicit memories of the past, manifested through Emotional Projection when the underlying cause of the tantrum is not known even for the child.

We can help our kids by converting negative implicit memories to explicit ones, where they can face their fears and rewrite the hurtful narrative. DVD player method - where we retell the event, but let them control the pace using an imaginary remote with pause and fast forward. Slowly but surely, they will be able to acknowledge what happened and truly move on.

Reflection questions - make memories more explicit by asking them questions that will encourage them to recollect and retell stories. Instead of "how was your day" which is usually replied with "okay", try things like "what was the best and worst moments of the day?" "Did you do an act of kindness today?"

Kill the Butterflies!

• memory is the way an event from the past influences us in the present. (Location 1038)
• every new experience causes certain neurons to fire, and when they do, they wire together, or link up, with other neurons that are firing at the same time. (Location 1048)
• The brain continually prepares itself for the future based on what happened before. Memories shape our current perceptions by causing us to anticipate what will happen next. (Location 1057)
• memory is all about linkages in the brain (as opposed to being alphabetical files to be accessed whenever needed), and that retrieved memories are by definition vulnerable to distortion (as opposed to being detail-for-detail accurate photocopies from your past). (Location 1071)
• implicit memories cause us to form expectations about the way the world works, based on our previous experiences. (Location 1107)
• when our kids seem to be reacting in unusually unreasonable ways, we need to consider whether an implicit memory has created a mental model that we need to help them explore. (Location 1118)
• The problem with an implicit memory, especially of a painful or negative experience, is that when we aren’t aware of it, it becomes a buried land mine that can limit us in significant and sometimes debilitating ways. (Location 1194)
• your goal is to help your kids take the troubling experiences that are impacting them without their knowledge—the scattered puzzle pieces in their mind—and make those experiences explicit so that the whole picture in the puzzle can be seen with clarity and meaning. (Location 1288)
• when you give your children lots of practice at remembering—by having them tell and retell their own stories—you improve their ability to integrate implicit and explicit memories. (Location 1295)
• “Tell me about your day. Give me one high point, one low point, and one act of kindness you performed for someone.” Again, activities and questions like these not only encourage recollection but also push children to think more deeply about their own emotions and actions, (Location 1318)

The United States of Me

We often mix between what we feel and who we are. Instead of saying "I feel lonely " we say "I am lonely". The latter forces us into a state that we can't escape from, it defines us in a narrow one-dimensional being kind of way. Fixed Mindset But we are a multitude, we are capable of a great variety of emotions and thoughts. This is conceptualized through mindsight, which is to understand both our mind and of others. It is helpful to use the wheel of awareness, to view ourself as a rim of many different thoughts and a hub which is our inner self. We choose what to focus on, and accordingly what to give power to, instead of it taking control of us.

The method is called SIFT, which is

1. Sensations - like hungry or tired
2. Images - what we "see" in our heads
3. Feelings - like anger and depression
4. Thoughts - like "I'm stupid" The more our child will be aware of those things, the easier it will be to change his perspective.

First we can help our child understand that emotions are fleeting. What we feel now won't last forever, they will feel differently in the future. So instead of "I'm stupid", go for "you are feeling stupid right now, but soon you won't be". Surf the Urge. Second of all, we need to provide them with the language to express what they're feeling. By naming the emotions it's more likely that they will recognize these emotions when they surface and understand their emotional state. Use complex language like disappointed, frustrated, angry or exited instead of just "good" or "bad".

Similarly with thoughts, we don't have to relate or believe all the thoughts that pop in our heads. We can practice mindfulness with them. This increases calmness and integration between different parts of the brain, and improve our ability to control our emotional state. Letting them picture their "happy place" could be helpful.

The United States of Me Integrating the Many Parts of the Self

• that’s where mental health and well-being begin, with achieving clarity and insight into our own individual mind. (Location 1394)
• Those fears and worries were definitely part of him, but they didn’t represent the totality of his being. Instead, from his hub at the center of the wheel, which was the most thoughtful and objective part of himself, he could choose how much attention to give them, as well as which other rim points he wanted to focus on. (Location 1414)
• When children experience a particular state of mind, such as feeling frustrated or lonely, they may be tempted to define themselves based on that temporary experience, as opposed to understanding that that’s simply how they feel at the moment. (Location 1441)
• This is one of the best things the wheel of awareness does: it teaches kids that they have choices about what they focus on and where they place their attention. It gives them a tool that lets them integrate the different parts of themselves, so they aren’t held hostage by one negative constellation of feelings or thoughts clamoring for their attention. (Location 1457)
• By directing our attention, we can go from being influenced by factors within and around us to influencing them. (Location 1508)
• feelings need to be recognized for what they are: temporary, changing conditions. They are states, not traits. (Location 1527)
• one of our most important parenting jobs is to help our children recognize and understand the different rim points of their individual wheel of awareness. (Location 1541)
• One reason kids often don’t express the complexity of a particular emotion is that they haven’t yet learned to think about their feelings in a sophisticated way that recognizes the variety and richness within them. (Location 1564)
• Kids can learn to pay attention to the thoughts running through their heads, and understand that they don’t have to believe every one of them. (Location 1577)
• that they don’t have to be victims of the sensations, images, feelings, and thoughts within them, and decide how they think and feel about their experiences. (Location 1611)

The Me-we Connection

It is a misconception to think of our human brain as an isolated organ. It is built for connection Human is a social being. It is constantly seeking and using signals from our social world, we are both influenced and influencing it. The key to that sense of connection and empathy are Mirror neurons which fire and cause us the same phenomenon not only when others do certain actions, but we also imitate emotional state.

We have the responsibility to serve as Role Models to what being a part of a "we" supposed to look. If we show that relationships are about caring, sharing, trust and communication, that's what the child will learn.

It's important to remember that we want to interact with our kids when they are in a receptive state rather than a reactional one. That's means not in the midst of an emotional storm, but before and after. Also remember that we don't want to erase their personal identity, the goal is balance, an integration between the "me" and the "we".

Shared fun - simply have shared fun with them. Goof around as a family, and between siblings Play. Having fun together is a bonding moment.

In cases of conflicts, emphasize:

1. Others perspective - try to show the situation through the other's eyes. Ask the child "why did he act in such a way?"
2. Nonverbal cues - point the child towards the other's body language so that they could understand nonverbal communication
3. Repairment - often just apologizing is not enough. After the apology, ask what can be done to "make it right". If a picture has been torn, why not draw a new one together? Apology

The Me-We Connection Integrating Self and Other

• Even children who don’t seem predisposed to connection and compassion can learn what it means to be in relationship, and to fulfill the responsibilities that come with it. (Location 1730)
• Insight and empathy. If we can encourage these attributes in our kids, we will give them the gift of mindsight, offering them awareness about themselves, and connection with those around them. (Location 1746)
• what happens between brains has a great deal to do with what happens within each individual brain. Self and community are fundamentally interrelated, since every brain is continually constructed by its interactions with others. (Location 1757)
• mirror neurons respond only to an act with intention, where there’s some predictability or purpose that can be perceived. (Location 1779)
• mirror neurons may allow us not only to imitate others’ behaviors, but actually to resonate with their feelings. (Location 1791)
• We are biologically equipped to be in relationships, to understand where other people are coming from, and to influence one another. (Location 1799)
• When relationships are cold and people are essentially distant, critical, or competitive, that influences what the child expects relationships to feel like. On the other hand, if the child experiences relationships full of nurturing warmth, connection, and protection, then that will become the model for future relationships—with (Location 1830)
• If we want to prepare kids to participate as healthy individuals in a relationship, we need to create within them an open, receptive state, instead of a closed, reactive one. (Location 1867)
• Often, in moments of reactivity, nonverbals (like hugs and empathetic facial expressions) will be much more powerful. (Location 1891)
• To become a part of a well-functioning “we,” a person needs also to remain an individual “me.” (Location 1901)
• “playful parenting” is one of the best ways to prepare your children for relationships and encourage them to connect with others. (Location 1909)
• With every fun, enjoyable experience you give your children while they are with the family, you provide them with positive reinforcement about what it means to be in loving relationship with others. (Location 1914)
• the more we can use our mindsight to view events through the eyes of another, the better chance we have of resolving conflict in a healthy manner. (Location 1960)

Conclusion

The whole brain approach has a ripple effect, what we teach our children goes out to their friends and the next generation.

Remember that you don't have to be perfect, you will make mistakes but even those moments are opportunities for growth.

Bringing it All Together

• You don’t need to become a perfect superparent or follow some sort of prescribed agenda that programs your kids to be ideal little robot children. You’ll still make plenty of mistakes (just as we do), and so will your kids (just as ours do). But the beauty of the whole-brain perspective is that it lets you understand that even the mistakes are opportunities to grow and learn. (Location 2104)
• don’t put too much pressure on yourself. We’ve emphasized the importance of taking advantage of the moments you have with your kids, but it’s not realistic to think you can do this 100 percent of the time. (Location 2116)