The video clip by Charlie Rose focuses on cognitive development in children. He argues that infants are not just empty vessels when they are born, but they come prepared to collect information from the environment and learn from them as they grow. This learning process explains how the brain develops in stages enabling children to learn from toys around them to other complicated things in their environment. According to Eric Kandel, children do not acquire knowledge all at once or consecutively, but they do learn systematically. That’s why a child may not be able to interpret something the same way someone else of an older age would interpret it. He continues to explain the stages of development, as described by Jean Piaget. Kandel explains that children understand specific things in a particular developmental stage. That’s why an adult would explain something differently from how a child would do it. Kandel continues to explain that Floyd in cognitive psychology was different from that of Jean. Floyd introduced the concept of experimental science in cognitive psychology.
Other speakers in the video, such as Patricia Kuhl, argue that the social brain controls children’s statistical capacity learning. Elizabeth Spelke joins in to add that as kids grow, they learn about language and learn from the things around them. The speakers add that exposure to the brain is crucial as it plays a more significant role in the child’s learning process. A child who has been exposed from an early age will have a better understanding of that particular compared to a child of the same age who may lack earlier brain exposure. More importantly, the speakers mention that children are good at getting the statistical structure of things and focusing on other people’s actions around them and learning from them. Generally, the video tries to explain that brain development in children happens in stages and not all at once or consecutively. This is why a child may fail to understand a particular thing in an earlier developmental stage, but at a later stage, the same child will be able to understand it well. Similarly, a child may develop neurodevelopmental disorders that may interfere with their retention, acquisition, and application of information or specific skills. Usually, educational and behavioral interventions can be used to manage these disorders.
From my perspective, I agree with most concepts, if not all, as discussed in the video. The brain of a child develops from infancy to three- producing millions of neural connections each second. Brain development in children is influenced by factors such as the child’s environment, relationships, and experiences, as explained in the video. In the first few years of a child’s life, the child’s brain forms millions of neural connections. When this rapid proliferation period is over, the brains enter pruning, whereby these connections are reduced to ensure that the brain circuits are efficient. As children develop from infancy to teenage years, their brain undergoes about a four-fold growth increase in its volume. This increase in the brain’s total size is accompanied by equal rapid changes in the cognitive, motor, and perceptual abilities of children and infants, as explained in the video.