Development of Intellectual Abilities in Children At Home

Intelligence (from Latin intellectus – “understanding,” “intellect”) consists of complex mental abilities; perception, thinking, attention, and memory. They are its essence. Primary school is the best age to activate the intellect in the home environment. At 6–10 years of age, all mental processes develop intensively.

To develop and strengthen the skills of mental activity, there are many interesting tasks and exercises that can help parents develop in their children the ability to think logically, memorize quickly, and be attentive. In this article, we will cover some of them.

Development of Visual Memory

The main goal of these exercises is the formation of visual memory. Such exercises contribute to the development of abstract thinking. For an illustrative example, below are some tasks on this topic.

Exercise 1: Take two picture cards and show them to your child. Leave one card whole and cut the other into five pieces, and ask the child to put the puzzle together from memory.

Exercise 2: Arrange the sticks in a simple shape in front of the child. Ask him to remember their location. Give him two seconds. Then disassemble the structure, and ask the child to assemble the parts in the same order. This game can be complicated by taking sticks of different colors. In this case, the child must reproduce what he saw using not only visual memory but also the ability to count.

Development of Auditory Memory

It is known that the potential of auditory, or as it is also called, auditory memory is weaker than visual. It is believed that the auditory nerve is much thinner than the optic nerve. We are accustomed to receiving up to 70% of information with the help of our eyes; thus, we often neglect the possibility of developing an auditory perception channel. A balanced, full development is extremely important for a child’s education; therefore, it is extremely important at a young age to give him the opportunity to develop his intellectual and other abilities as widely as possible.

Exercise 1: Throw the ball to the child while calling out any alphabet letter. The child, in turn, must name any word beginning with that letter. For example, “A” – Apple, army, Actor. (Use nouns, adjectives, and adverbs). Practice this exercise for 3-5 minutes.

Exercise 2: Say a series of words and, at the same time, invite the child to draw them on paper. After drawing up the picture, the child should try to reproduce the dictated words.

Development of Memory and Thinking

Learning becomes more difficult with age. Therefore, it is very important not to waste the moment of raising a child and give him maximum opportunities to learn and develop necessary life skills during this time. The exercises below are quite simple, but at the same time, they train the memory and thinking process well.

Exercise 1: Write a long word on paper and show the child. Then cut the word into separate parts and ask the child to reunite the word into its original version. This game is very popular with children, as it includes not only the thought process but also the ability to do something with their hands.

Exercise 2: Pick up 5-6 words. Ask your child to come up with association words for each. For example, for the word “summer” – holidays, heat, beach.

Development of Attention

The word attention means to act or state of attending or heeding. To develop attention abilities prepare a drawing with intricate lines- Show line numbers on one side of the page and draw boxes on the other side. Each line starts on the left and ends on the right.

Exercise 1: Task the child to trace each line and write down its number in the cell where it ends. We start with the first line and then move on to the second, so we need to trace all the lines. The child must perform this exercise only with their eyes, without using a finger or a pencil.

Exercise 2: Arrange a paired picture, task the child to look at it, and find and count the differences in them.

Exercise 3: While reading, task the child that he should give a sign when he hears a conditional phrase in the text. As such a phrase, you choose a sentence or words from the text you are reading.

Development of Thinking

One of the important features of the child in the future is the development of thinking. It is important to start paying attention to this as early as possible. There is such a thing as a “sensitive period” (from 1 year to 7 years of age). This is the optimal stage for the development of a particular skill. The exercises below are quite simple, but at the same time, they train the memory and thinking process well.

Exercise 1: Offer the child 4-5 words that are not the same in meaning (pencil, flower, candy, shampoo, and book). Task the child to make sentences that connect all the words and build a short story.

Exercise 2: Give a toy and a sheet divided into four squares. The child must move the toy around the squares, following your instructions: left, up, right, down.

Exercise 3: Offer 20 shuffled cards of trees, fish, clothes, birds, and shoes (4 each). Ask the child to name each group with one word. Ask him to combine these 5 words into two groups and explain why he combined them so.

Development of Perception

Perception in early childhood is the leading mental function. The child establishes connections between perceived objects. He can only be attentive to what is in his field of perception.

Psychologists divide the development of perception in children into three periods (early age, preschool, and younger preschool age). Early-age and preschool-age stages are essential for the formation of personality. The exercises below are quite simple, but at the same time, they helpful in perception development.

Exercise 1: Offer a card with drawings in the form of geometric shapes (squares, triangles, circles). Ask them to find the number of shapes of each type.

Exercise 2: Lay out the mixed-cut parts of the drawings (vegetables, fruits, cars). Ask to collect an image. Items in the drawings can be of different sizes.

Conclusion

Up-mentioned exercises will help develop intellectual skills; you can create these exercises yourself. Create an atmosphere in the house for the harmonious intellectual development of children, and pay attention to the versatile development of the intellectual abilities of younger students.

If you found this article helpful, visit our other blogs to learn more.