Not surprisingly, most of these windows occur during the critical first few years of life. During these times each part of the brain grows a little larger, and becomes a lot more active, in response to what the five senses absorb. The following windows summarize important stages in a young child's development. Ages will vary, windows do not totally close. Neural networks and resulting skills continue to build upon the foundation set down during prime times.
Movement stimulates the growth of nerve cells and increases the number of connections in the brain.
At the other end of life, physical exercise has been found to prevent the deterioration of aging brains. All these images help shape the brain's ability to recognize and organize visual information. For this reason, anything that interferes with clear vision, such as cataracts or nearsightedness should be corrected early. Regular eye exams starting as young as 2 weeks of age can detect problems that if left uncorrected, can cause a weak or unused eye to lose its functional connections to the brain. The window is much shorter for a first language.