Below are the results of a study on IQ that has left many parents astonished.
What is the most important thing when raising a child?
While we often say: As long as children grow up healthy and happy, that is what matters most. But the body is very honest, and nothing is more important than improving your child’s IQ and academic performance.
Ways to Improve Young Children’s IQ
Richard E. Nisbett – Professor of Psychology at the University of Michigan, noted in his book “Intelligence and How to Get It” that engaging in lively discussions can significantly enhance the IQ of young children.
Another study conducted on high school students involved randomly selecting some newly admitted students from two different high schools for an experiment. Group A represented the experimental group, while Group B served as the control group.
Students in Group A were assigned special courses on “Creative Problem Solving,” while students in Group B received regular class instruction.
Engaging in lively discussions can improve IQ. (Illustrative image).
The “Creative Problem Solving” course primarily included the following content:
- 1. Proposing Multiple Solutions: Encourage students to think of as many different ways as possible to solve a problem.
- 2. Rephrasing the Problem: Ask students to present the problem in as many different ways as possible, helping them understand the issue from various perspectives.
- 3. Combining Elements: When designing exercises, emphasize linking distant elements rather than closely related ones.
- 4. Reorganizing and Restructuring Problematic Situations: Students are required to fundamentally rearrange and reframe problematic situations to find satisfactory solutions.
- 5. Divergent Thinking: Place special emphasis on activities that promote divergent thinking, meaning generating as many solutions as possible instead of searching for a single correct answer.
- 6. Conducting Regular Training: In the experiment, students engaged in this type of creative problem-solving exercise at least once a week for three years.
- 7. Integrating into the School Curriculum: Incorporate creative thinking exercises into the school curriculum, such as math, science, language, and other subjects.
Four years after the experiment, scientists conducted multiple rounds of IQ testing on students in Group A to assess the effectiveness of training, including measuring fluid intelligence (Gf) and crystallized intelligence (Gc). The result showed that the average IQ of students in Group A increased by 10 – 15 points.
Ways to Help Young Children Improve Their IQ
How can we help children develop their creative problem-solving skills at home? Parents can consider the following methods:
1. Combining Elements
Encourage children to connect unrelated objects to create something new.
In the book “Write My Heart”, the author presents a writing exercise as a synthesis of various elements we can learn from. The author suggests that on a blank piece of paper, list 10 nouns on the left, any nouns will do, such as dinosaur, violin, husband…
Then, list any professions on the right, such as chef, and write down 10 verbs related to that profession, like cooking, cutting, sawing,… After that, connect these words to form new sentences or even a story.
(Illustrative image).
2. Divergent Thinking
Not thinking at all and waiting for inspiration can also be an interesting method. Have you ever noticed that the things you dream about are always fantastic, but when you wake up, you never remember them?
Edison took advantage of this and created over 2,000 inventions in his lifetime. However, Edison did not completely fall asleep; otherwise, he would have forgotten many of his great ideas.
Edison’s method was to hold something in his hand, lie half on the sofa and sleep; inspiration would come during this half-asleep state. If he fell into a deep sleep, the object in his hand would drop to the floor, waking him up to jot down the inspiration he just had. This way, he captured the flashes of inspiration when awake.
When a child faces an unsolvable problem, take them for a walk. Many people are using this technique.
