First Things First: What is the Guided Participation Relationship?

Human brains possess very little neural collaboration at birth. Our brains are experience-dependent. They are works in progress that become more complex and efficient as we continually explore, discover and broaden our world, first through the eyes of our parents and later by our sense of self and emotional connections. Throughout life, we increase the brain's productive networking capacity during special types of experiences choreographed through the guidance of our parents and close family members. This special type of learning relationship is referred to as the Guided Participation Relationship.

From the middle of the first year of life, hour-by-hour, day-by-day, in every culture on earth, infants interact with parents and other important adults in thousands of deceptively simple encounters with a very serious underlying agenda: constructing the foundational architecture of the child's brain.

The Guided Participation Relationship is dependent on two equally significant roles, that of the guide and that of the apprentice. Essential to development, each is a partner in a developmental dance, responsible for a growing synchronization. The guide is responsible for providing challenging moments for mental and neural growth on an ongoing basis; the apprentice for joining in this shared, emotional attachment.

Apprentices who routinely experience challenges as safe and successful develop a strong motivation to explore and expand their world, as well as a sense of general well being, competence and trust in themselves and their guides. Most of us are fortunate to have been active participants in the Guided Participation Relationship. We learned to enjoy change and novelty and not be threatened by it. We learned that the world could be a place where we could feel competent, despite constant variations and unexpected events that characterize daily life. We learned to strive to connect to our family's emotional life and share their experiences. And, as parents, although at times it seemed difficult, our children's development took place in a natural intuitive manner that appeared as a wonderful mystery.

What happens when the Guided Participation Relationship breaks down?