24th September Seminar
Theme: Importance of Play in Developing Spatial Skills, Language and Math
Time: 10am-3pm (9-10am Registration)
Venue: NTU Novena Campus, Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine Lecture Theatre, 11 Mandalay Road
Cost: $20 per adult
(Bring your partner and children for free!)
Coffee and refreshments provided.
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Barbara Landau
Johns Hopkins University
Dick and Lydia Todd Professor
Director, Science of Learning Institute
Dr. Barbara Landau is a cognitive scientist with broad interests in human cognition and its development. Dr. Landau’s research focuses on the mental representation of space and language, its acquisition, its use in adulthood, and its compromise under neurological damage due to brain injury or genetic abnormalities.
Speaker: Dr. Amy Shelton
Johns Hopkins University
Director of research for the Center for Talented Youth and Professor
Associate Dean for Research and Doctoral Programs in the School of Education
Dr. Shelton’s research in cognitive psychology/cognitive neuroscience focuses on spatial skills, individual differences, and mechanisms of learning, couched in the broad context of understanding the characterization and needs of the individual learner.
Title:
Learning to talk about where things are: What’s easy, what’s hard, and how you as a parent can help
It’s often observed that young children are “experts” at learning language, rapidly and easily learning many words for object, actions, and events around them. Among the most important words in a young child’s vocabulary are the little words that describe where things are— for example, in, on, under, etc. Although these words are learned early and easily by very young children, they are surprisingly complex in their meanings; their uses also vary significantly across languages, creating a potential challenge for a multi-lingual learner. I’ll discuss what is easy for young children to learn, why learning the complexities of spatial language becomes more difficult later in life, and how you as a parent can contribute to your child’s mastery of these important words.
Title:
Block Building as a Building Block for 21st Century Skills: The Case for Spatial Play
