What Modern Neuroscience Tells Us About Parenting and Child Development
Course Overview
This self-paced online course translates modern neuroscience, attachment theory, and developmental psychology into compassionate, practical parenting guidance. You’ll learn to understand children’s behaviour as a reflection of brain development, nervous system regulation, and felt safety—moving beyond rewards and punishment toward a relationship-based, brain-informed approach that supports lifelong wellbeing.
Course Information
- Format: Self-paced online learning
- Approach: Neuroscience-informed, attachment-focused, relationship-based
- Suitable for: Parents of infants, children, and adolescents; caregivers and whānau; educators and support workers
- Features: Interactive content, quizzes, practical strategies, links to external resources
- Focus: Translating science into calm, confident, everyday parenting responses
- Prerequisites: None—plain-language, accessible neuroscience
What Will You Learn?
- How children’s behaviour and emotions are driven by the nervous system
- The role of safety, stress, and attachment in brain development
- The difference between survival-mode (bottom-up) and intentional (top-down) behaviour
- How co-regulation builds lifelong emotional regulation skills
- Why children can’t learn when overwhelmed—and how to support regulation first
- How early experiences shape the brain, and why change and healing are always possible
- Brain development across infancy, early childhood, and adolescence
- The neuroscience of play, neuroplasticity, mirror neurons, and learning through connection
- How to read behaviour as communication and respond with curiosity and empathy
- Why “good enough” parenting—not perfection—builds resilience and emotional security
- How to adapt strategies to your child’s unique temperament, sensitivity, and development
Course Features
- Narrration & Voiceover
- Interactive content
- Quizzes
- Links to external resources
Estimated Duration
The course will take approximately 1 hour to complete.
