Customer Reviews

From Neurons to Neighborhoods : The Science of Early Childhood Development

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The product of a two and one half year investigation involving 22 members of the Committee on Integrating the Science of Early Childhood Development. This committee is part of the National Academy of Sciences. The funding for the study came from a wide range of public and private sponsors. The best minds in the fields of neurobiological studies and behavioral and social sciences converge to create the "SCIENCE" of early childhood development. The old "nature vs. nurture" battle is revisited as well as the impact of culture on development. This book contains an in-depth discussion of the latest early brain development information. Research well-documents the fact that the first years of life are important! They build the base for future development. "Windows of opportunity" do not "close" at certain ages making learning impossible. However, learning of some skills is easier in early life. The effort to develop these skills past the "window of opportunity" involves not only more work but the extra cost of intervention.

Environment is important to early learning. Relationships, however, are the core of it all in early childhood. This book clearly spells this out so policy makers and businesses will know what is necessary in the making of our next generation.

This is a valuable resource for any professional library.

An amazing breadth and depth of neuroscience and its implications for how we treat children. Must reading for anyone wishing to get beyond prejudice and rhetoric to the core of what needs to be done in public policy to protect and preserve childhood in modern America. Should be 5 stars, but now a little dated, although references are excellent and it's not hard to follow the themes into the most recent research.

I purchased this book, because I am doing a Graduate Diploma in Maternal & Child Health in Australia. Many of our lecturers were taking quotes from this book and referring to Jack Schonkoff's remarks contained within, pertaining to new evidence on myelination and the importance of interaction and stimulation of small children and the relationship between this and brain growth. It is easy to read and I am confident that both the lay person and health professional alike will glean valuable insight. I find myself constantly referring to this book and know that this will have an effect on my future practice as a Maternal and Child Health Nurse.

This book is a staple in the early childhood mental health field. It represents everything good in the promotion of social-emotional development in our society. Creating neurobiologically friendly environments for young children is a crossroad our society faces in an effort to have a positive impact on the mental health for our time. Implications for risk and resilience research contributions are included.

"Neurons to Neighborhood" has played a seminal role in increasing recognition among early childhood professionals and the general public of the critical role of neural development during the first years of life on subsequent life outcomes. In particular, it identifies childhood poverty as perhaps the major factor causing later cognitive and emotional deficits and disparities. That said, the book is ten years old and badly in need of a revision both to include important new research but to address a new audience. It is basically a public policy report and hence written in the mind-numbingly boring prose which seems de rigeur within the Beltway. Dr. Shonkoff's Center on the Developing Child has done an admirable job publishing short, accessible precis of many of the books findings. What is needed, in my opinion, is a shorter, more concise and more intellectually provocative work of "popular science" and social analysis.

I received the book in in a timely fashion, and the book is in great condition.

The book was iin better condition than i expected, and it sent out the day after i ordered it.