The Children’s Reading Foundation of Haines is sponsoring two upcoming classes geared toward getting your babies bopping and boogieing.
The free classes will be taught by Christine Roberts, founder of Nurturing Pathways, an early childhood creative dance program that focuses on movement as a gateway to cognitive development and school readiness.
The first class, for parents with children up to 4 years old, is from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. Sunday at the Zumba studio on Main Street. The second class, for caregivers and educators interested in learning about movement and the developing brain, is from 6 to 8 p.m. at Head Start.
Jeanne Kitayama, the foundation’s executive director, said the opportunity to bring Roberts to Haines arose because of a local connection. Resident Deborah Marshall, Roberts’ sister, asked the foundation if it would be interested in the Nurturing Pathways classes.
The Nurturing Pathways program focuses on the assertion that “movement is the gateway to learning during the first four years of life, because sensory-motor and social development preceded language and logic skills,” according to the program’s website.
The program’s emphasis fits with the reading foundation’s mission, Kitayama said. “Basically, our focus is young kids 0 to 4, and to get the parent involved. That is the prime time to learn: when the brain is developing the most,” she said.
The dance session will emphasize three skills, including cognitive flexibility (the capacity to override visual or auditory stimuli and focus on another relationship), working memory (adding information to previous experience to boost learning) and self-regulation or inhibitory control (regulating sensory modulation for focus and attention).
Roberts holds a bachelor’s degree in dance from Connecticut College. She also holds several certificates in infant development and dance instruction.
Call Jenn Allen at 303-7383 for more information.