The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind

by Daniel J. Siegel

Spending time with family and friends and learning about relationships, especially with face-to-face interactions, will wire it in yet other ways.

This wire-and-rewire process is what integration is all about: giving our children experiences to create connections between different parts of the brain.

The reason her brain isn’t always capable of integration is simple: it hasn’t had time to develop. In fact, it’s got a long way to go, since a person’s brain isn’t considered fully developed until she reaches her mid-twenties.

The rate of brain maturation is largely influenced by the genes we inherit. But the degree of integration may be exactly what we can influence in our day-to-day parenting.