Live Streams Coming Soon from Mississippi Thrive!

Did you know that a baby’s brain grows rapidly during the first five years of life? More than one million neural connections form every second! The more brain building opportunities your child has in these first five years – like talking, reading, and singing with adults – the stronger those brain connections will be. This helps prepare your child for future learning, relationships, and life experiences.

Would you like to discover ways to build your child’s brain every day? A responsive and caring relationship with at least one adult is key in the first few years of life, because that is when important skills form that will be used later in life — memory retention, self-control, attention span, focus, and more. You already have what it takes to teach these skills by simply turning routinely shared moments with your child into learning moments.

Team members from the Child Health and Development Project, Mississippi Thrive! are excited to have the opportunity to bring you ten live stream events through the Parents & Kids Magazine Facebook page over the coming months. Each live stream will demonstrate an easy way to make an everyday moment an opportunity to support your child’s development. Mississippi Thrive! will be sharing videos of real families using Vroom Tips™. Vroom Tips™ show parents how to make mealtime, bath time, bedtime, or any time into brain building opportunities.

Each Vroom Tip™ is backed by science. A brainy background explains the skill the Vroom Tip™ can promote in the child’s development. Vroom shares the science of early learning by promoting these five actions that can help your child’s brain grow:

1. Take turns: Children learn from taking turns.
2. Follow: Having you follow their lead helps them learn. Repeat their words and movements.
3. Look: Eye-to-eye contact, funny faces, and smiles all help your child’s brain make connections.
4. Chat: A child’s brain lights up when you talk or make sounds to them.
5. Stretch: Stretch your moments with children by asking what, when, where, how, or why. This helps their brains grow stronger.

You can access Vroom Tips™ at www.vroom.org and even sign up to have them sent to your phone or computer on a regular basis.

Watch for our Mississippi Thrive! upcoming live streams on the Parent & Kids Facebook page, and see Vroom Tips™ in action. Learn how talking to your baby, dealing with an emotional toddler, or even sorting the laundry can be a brain building activity for your child.

You can learn more about early childhood development, Vroom, and other resources on our website www.MississippiThrive.com.

Mississippi Thrive! is working to improve the developmental and behavioral health of children ages 0-5 in Mississippi. We are doing this by working with parents, early childhood professionals, and health care providers to enhance attention to developmental milestones and strengthen children’s brain architecture. The Child Health and Development Project: Mississippi Thrive! (CHDP) is a joint project of the University of Mississippi Medical Center’s (UMMC) Center for the Advancement of Youth (CAY) and the Social Science Research Center (SSRC) of Mississippi State University (MSU). The CHDP is funded by the Health Resources Services Administration (HRSA).