Brain Rules for Baby (John Medina) / quote 28 of 91
Five ingredients of the intelligence stew
Many ingredients make up the human intelligence stew, and I’d like to describe five that I think you would do well to consider as you contemplate your child’s intellectual gifts. They are: • The desire to explore • Self-control • Creativity • Verbal communication • Interpreting nonverbal communication Most of these characteristics fall outside the spectrum of the usual IQ suspects. We believe many have genetic roots; most can be seen in newborns. Rooted as these five ingredients may be in our evolutionary history, however, they do not exist in isolation from the outside world. Nurture—even for Teddy Roosevelt—plays an important role in whether a child is able to maximize his or her intelligence.