By Melanated Glow
Our children are born into this World created with nine months of adult living through their mother. They share every experience with her during their development in the womb. During that time, they are listening, feeling, and being. This is the beginning of their life. At the time of their arrival, they enter this World sorting through everything they heard during their womb development. Even though they come here with a natural genius in them, it is important that we Awaken the Natural Genius of Black Children as indicated in the title of the book written by Dr. Amos Wilson.
The title of the book, also called the “Pink Book” by those who read the ancestor’s writings, speaks to who our children are and our responsibility as parents for their ability to operate at their maximum potential. Everything needs a specific environment for optimal growth. For instance, speaking to a child in complete sentences helps them to formulate sentences and understand syntax. Some people tend to talk to children using “baby language”. This is not the language that the child heard in the womb and mimicking this talk does not develop them into a child that can speak and comprehend as well as a child taught correct manner of speech through modeling.
As the adults of the community, it is our responsibility to enhance the intelligence of our children so they could become an asset by seeing and thinking their ways to solutions that benefit us as a whole. These characteristics are developed in the child by the age of 3 and “the nature of the home environment at six months can give us some indication of how the infant’s mind is going to be at three and four years old.” (Wilson, “Awakening the Natural Genius of Black Children”) This timeline indicates the importance of every moment post conception as the development of the child is concerned. The critical years of birth happen when the children first arrive into this existence.
Our children, as newborns and infants, are capable of processing information, responsive to their environments, learn, and act. Some say they are the best psychologists, able to play on the minds and hearts of the adult. This innate ability must be encouraged, stimulated, exercised, and challenged. We are consistently amazed at the personalities and abilities of our children, expressed by saying things like “they have been here before”. Although we know that there is something special about the children we birth, we do not always equip them with the environmental needs and appropriate mental challenges that will set the tone for the rest of their lives.
Continuing with Dr. Amos Wilson’s writing, the psychomotor development of our children is highly advanced in comparison to European’s children development. A few interesting statistics states that our children are able to look into the face of a person at two days old while it takes European children 8 weeks; our children can support themselves in a sitting position and watch themselves in the mirror at 7 weeks while it takes European children 20 weeks. Our children can take a round block out of its hole in a form board in 5 months while it takes the European child 11 months.
In spite of the physical advances that are directly related to the potential level of intelligence, our children are not consistently at the top of the class. So, if we are born adequately prepared to be geniuses, what happens in the interim so that we end up wasting our potential? Parents have the most impact on the child. Mothers who teach their children have a different response from the child and the connection is automatic like it has been there from conception, because it has. The one voice that the child has heard during his or her development in the womb was the voice of the mother. We all long for the love of our mother and father. It is the words of our parents that hold the most weight. Therefore, it is our responsibility to learn our children, teach our children, create a loving environment for them, express high expectations for them, appropriately challenge them, and be that support to usher them into the natural geniuses that they are.
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