There is a persistent and ever widening divide in our country between those who have plenty and those who suffer poverty. Nowhere are the effects of that divide more harmful, and often irreversible, than in the lives of the children born into poverty. It is in the experiences of those early years, from conception through age three, when the brain develops to 80 percent of its capacity, that a course for long-term well-being is set.

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A new study by Harvard and University of California Berkley found children in Memphis who are born into poverty are more likely to stay poor because the city is the most economically segregated in the nation, meaning poor neighborhoods are clustered together and more wealthy neighborhoods are off on their own.

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What it's All About

I expected my parenting experience to be more calculating, more specifically purposeful than it has manifested in reality. ... I didn’t realize the foundational education I was tasked with edifying her with was buried in a gigantic mountain of squealing, hysterical fun.

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The term fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) refers to the most severe permanent effects of a child's exposure to alcohol while in the mother's womb, including mental retardation, abnormal physical appearance and behavior, and extreme limitation of normal lifetime capabilities. Less extreme effects of fetal alcohol exposure may include permanent brain damage plus lifelong behavioral, educational and socialization problems; these are referred to as fetal alcohol spectrum disorders. (FASD)

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