Importance Of Physical Environment For Our Children’s Optimal Development

The indoor and outdoor physical environment affects and fosters the optimal growth and development of both children and grownups as it provides them with an opportunity to explore and learn. It has a significant impact on the level of engagement of the kids, their academic achievements, cognitive, social and emotional development and the quality of interaction between parents and children. The amount, design, and use of space, both outdoors and indoors, are equally important and should be taken into account. Clean and Safe Еnvironment A clean and tidy environment keeps your kids healthy and energized. To support their normal physical development we should maintain a high level of cleanliness, improve the air quality, and use only natural detergents for the household chores. Dust, mold, pests, smoke, and pet dander can trigger asthma attacks and allergies. Store pesticides and toxic chemicals in places where children can't reach them and carefully wash fruits and vegetables before eating. Don't allow yourself or others smoke in your house or car. The Impact of Loud Crowds and Noise Loud noises affect badly our children’s cognitive development, reading abilities, long-term memory, physiological indicators, and motivation. The most common noises which interfere with our calm and peaceful daily lives are cars, public transportation, airplanes, music and crowds. Researches reveal substantial reading delays for children exposed to airport noise. Chronic loud noise exposure can lead to a rise in their blood pressure and cause stress. Crowding influence children’s mental and biological health, motivation, interpersonal behaviors and cognitive development. It is not the family size of the highest importance, but the number of family members per room. Researches demonstrate that 10-12-year-old kids are prone to withdraw in overcrowded cases in an attempt to cope with overstimulating situations. Parental behavior in crowded households emerge as less responsive to younger children. Overcrowding aggravates parent-child relationships, stimulates punitive parental education measures and influences kids’ emotional, health and social performance. Elementary school-aged children with huge families boast higher levels of stress and behavior struggles in school. rnKids aged 6-12 display drops in motivational behavior and also show a level of learned helplessness, or the acceptance that they have no control over the situation and therefore do not try to change it, even though they have the ability to do so. Housing and Neighborhood Families living in a high-rise housing have fewer contacts with neighbours as compared to the single-family dwellings. To ensure a normal social development for your children you should take into consideration the following neighbourhood characteristics: street traffic, noise, housing quality, toxic exposure, crowding, health and educational facilities. Children prefer natural settings which allow them to develop gross motor abilities and lessen the adverse effects of chronic stress.