What can we do to help young brains thrive? Babies whose parents frequently engage and talk with them know 300 more words by age two than those that don't.

The human brain is the most complex thing on earth and birth to five years sees the fastest rate of brain development. 60% of all energy a baby expends is concentrated in the brain and 90% of a child’s brain development occurs before they even walk into a classroom. That’s why the first five years of a child’s life a crucial.

"Children need happy healthy parents. I think what we should do is think about parenting in terms of whether we're providing good enough parenting as opposed to whether we're providing perfect parenting." Dr Jack Shonkoff, Center Director, Harvard University Center for the Developing Child.

It’s no secret that central to quality early learning and care are the educators working with your child and their specialist knowledge, skills and capacity to nurture positive relationships. However, there is a lot that parents can do to support and strengthen this relationship.

If parents are providing a good home learning environment for children with lots of different activities like sharing books and having conversations, letters, numbers and singing, with some early learning in the mix, parents can be confident they're giving their children the best start in life.

Dr Lesley Jones shares some insights on what is driving children's behaviour and gives parents some simple and actionable strategies to take away and implement. Working with children's behaviour can be challenging and there are simple things we can all do as adults in relationships with children that can make a real difference.