The importance of proper cognitive development in children is hardly discussed in Uganda. This is mostly because some people have no clue about what it is. Cognitive development is the progress made in thinking and reasoning abilities as a person grows. It is basically how a person relates with the world around them, for example, thinking through a problem and solving it. Cognitive development starts the moment a child is born as they respond to the new environments around them. But the most significant cognitive development happens between 0 and 5 years. The quality of cognitive development in the first five years of a child determines the kind of life they will lead in future.

In Uganda, it is common to find parents and guardians perplexed about the curiosity of their toddlers and children in general. It being an eyebrow-raising matter stems from the cultural background of Uganda as a country. Ugandan children are taught to be quiet and obedient, not very expressive of their natural curiosity, and yet all children are naturally very curious and want to explore. Traditionally, well mannered children always listened and rarely asked questions–which was always seen as challenging authority. This was a very valid concept at the time because parents and the elderly in society knew almost every thing there was to know. Back then, exposure to the outside world was very minimal and non-existent in some communities. There was no new information coming in per second compared to the world we live in now. There was no television and above all, the internet. The birth and embracing of technology raised and continues to raise questions among not only children but adults as well. Children are known to be curious. They ask about anything and everything which also becomes an irritating matter if parents are not exposed to the fact that asking questions is a crucial part of cognitive development today. It is also important for parents to remember that children are exposed to so much information at such a young age compared to how it was in the olden days. They ask questions to understand the world around them and in very rare circumstances with an intent to irritate.

"Traditionally, well mannered children always listened and rarely asked questions–which was always seen as challenging authority"

Proper cognitive development has a couple of advantages: processing information faster and more skillfully, understanding why they do the things they do/grasping the cause and effect of things, and improved analytical skills, among others. It affects how children internalize information and approach life in general. Some ways of promoting quality cognitive development in children 0-5 years include sing-alongs, identifying noises from different animals, practicing the alphabet, and offering choices like presenting two outfits so they can pick one, among others. All these activities promote meaningful engagement with a child and along the way stimulate their brain to start thinking and reasoning intellectually.

A 2020 UNICEF report shows that every 6 in 10 children in Uganda between the age of 3-5, are not attending pre-primary which can also be called kindergarten. This number could have definitely gone higher because of yearly population increase backed by increased poverty stemming from limited employment opportunities for parents to support their children through kindergarten. While children grow up touching soil, leaves and whatever their hands can land on which is a natural occurrence process in cognitive development, kindergarten provides an external guided experience through the same process hence yielding better tuned children when it comes to problem solving and memory capabilities among other aspects.

The major contributor to lack of cognitive development is poverty in Uganda. Poverty makes it impossible for parents to take their children to school, particularly pre-primary school. Some parents even look at this as a waste of funds they do not even have. Most mothers are usually preoccupied with meeting their children’s basic needs which lowers the chances of investing in the cognitive development of their children.

Ugandan parents, more so those in rural areas, are not aware of cognitive development and thus hardly intentionally engage in these beneficial practices for the good of their children. This can be partly attributed to the staggering number of teenage pregnancies in the country-circumstances in which we have babies grooming babies. Babies who have such young and inexperienced parents are least likely to enjoy such meaningful engagements with their parents. The emotional burden of teenage mothers to look after their babies, figure out a way to go to school, deal with public shame and at the same time find a source of income to sustain their families is immense and does not encourage such a “waste of time”.

The importance of proper cognitive development can no longer be underrated because it directly affects the quality of the population, hence the development of the country. Also, looking at the kind of country Uganda is, culture plays a significant role in inhibiting proper cognitive development. It is common practice to find children having very little interaction time with their parents, who are usually much-feared authority figures. This leads to timidness and a big setback in cognitive development.

Some solutions that can be taken up to address this issue include: 1) fighting poverty in Uganda through promoting vocational education especially for young parents to enable them find stable sources of income to be able to support their children through pre-primary education 2) It is vital that all relevant stakeholders carry out sensitization on the matter of cognitive development. The biggest inhibitor to proper cognitive development has been ignorance about it. Training and tasking antenatal practitioners, for example, to pass on cognitive development information to pregnant mothers, their husbands and supporting households would go a long way in dealing with the ignorance. 3) Fighting teenage pregnancies through mass sensitization in communities, churches, mosques and schools. It is vital that people understand the repercussions of teenage pregnancy on quality of life for the children. An unmarried pregnant mother is less likely to amply provide for and educate her child.

It is important to remember that when your child is asking questions, it is best to answer and guide them with the right information, because the world (the media and other people) will more readily furnish them with its own information. While taking children to kindergartens and the like, it's important to find time to talk to them and let them know they can ask questions. The hope for a better country lies in the quality of its population. Proper cognitive development plays a crucial role in boosting the human capacity of its population. Taking up this mantle would enable us to fight problems like peer pressure, poor decision-making and reckless behavior. Proper cognitive development has proven to pave way for efficient problem solvers as well as boosting confidence as children take on different challenges or tasks. . Improving the quality of the population would be a positive contributor to Uganda’s development, and this can be done through supporting proper cognitive development.