Experts in cognitive development believe the first five years of a child's life is the most important stage in intelligence formation and brain function.

What your child experience in his or her early years shapes who he or she will be, influences their harmony, their emotions, their performance in school, their relationships, and their future.

Here are seven tips on how you can influence your child’s development through simple interactions:

Play and talk to your children more often

Parents can show their love by playing and talking to their children. This can help them to build emotional intelligence. When children spend more quality time interacting with their parents, it will develop their emotional and social skills faster than those who do not. By hugging, singing, and doing household chores together, parents and children can build up wonderful memories and create joy around them.

Turn mistakes into lessons

Teach children to view their mistakes as learning opportunities instead of failures. For example, if they fall during play, they should seek to identify the cause and learn to be more careful in the future, rather than stopping play entirely. Through such lessons, they can learn to pick themselves up and take away important life skills such as resiliency and competency. At Kinderland, children are given ample opportunities to build their resilience through mistakes. It does not matter if the child cannot spell rightly on their first few tries. Through Kinderland's phonics program, the school helps children to gain more confidence in being able to spell on their own.

Reading and storytelling with children

Reading and sharing stories can help children get to know sounds, words, language and develop their literacy skills. Stories can also spark your child’s imagination and curiosity, bringing them to amazing places and introducing them to extraordinary characters. Children exercise their conceptual understanding and vocabulary when answering parents’ questions and queries. Above it all, children get to spend quality time with their parents while learning in comfort!

Story time has always been children’s favorite at Kinderland. It is no surprise why the school's children are always so excited as they immerse themselves in stories that their teachers share creatively through role playing or hand puppet shows.

Develop your child’s reading habit

The best way to raise a love for and interest in reading is to simply read to your child. When children see parents reading frequently, they will subconsciously imitate the adults' actions. During weekends, family can have a great time going to a bookstore and allow their children to choose books or comics that they are interested in under guidance. There is no need to wait till your child is able to read to buy a book. Parents can engage their child by discussing the pictures and characters in the book, asking questions related to the story, to help them develop their literacy skills and spur their creativity.

Encourage them to do exercise

Physical exercise not only makes children healthy, but also helps them to develop intelligence as regular exercises will help to regulate blood flow to the brain and regenerate brain cells. Kinderland's Kinderfit program allows its children to acquire fundamental movement skills while the development of self-confidence, responsible habits, team spirit, and a positive attitude toward a healthy lifestyle are emphasized.

Nurture their creativity

Creativity will also help to develop problem-solving skills, innovation, and discovery in children. Allow children to have their space to draw or attempt art and crafts independently. Motivate them to express themselve and give compliments to their creation. Allow children to solve daily challenges and seek to find alternate resolutions as well.

Growing with music

Music can benefit your child in many areas such as language, math, concentration, and social skills, among others. When children's moving follows the music, the brain parts that control the hearing and movement functions both work at the same time. That also happens when children play musical instruments, then children can learn how to coordinate between their eyes, ears, hands, feet, and the whole body. Body vibrations from a singing child contribute to lowering cortisol (stress hormone) levels, releasing endorphins, and making your child feel happy. Learning to play musical instruments requires children to use multiple senses that enhance brain functions.