Pearl and kindy
Aug. 14th, 2012 07:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
emma_in_dreamI met with Pearl’s teacher today and I am very pleased. She says Pearl has come a long way. This was my impression as well. Instead of running about, aggressively hugging other children and roaring in their faces, she now generally plays cooperatively (though bossily). I get the feeling that at the beginning of the year they thought she was a bit strange but now they said she is not even the oddest child in the class of twenty! Yes!
I flagged my concerns about next year. In pre-primary the kids spend a lot of time sitting down doing the kind of work that was previously done in grade one. Her biggest areas needing improvement is sitting quietly and fine motor control. This is difficult, in part, because her core muscles are so weak that sitting is difficult and her hands lack strength. The problems are something the teacher had already anticipated and we talked a bit about sorts of cushions to help her sit and the possibility of using an IPad if writing is too difficult.
Having listed her biggest areas in need of improvement, I should balance this by adding her biggest improvements throughout the year. Using the toilets, standing in the line if closely watched, playing with the other kids, having fewer tantrums. Just great social development all round really.
The one thing I did not find helpful is that pre-primary will be compulsory next year. She is still completely exhausted by two three quarter days at school so I can’t imagine that she will cope with five days. (I see no other children in the class who lie down on the ground at the end of the second day and say they need to have a sleep.) Of course she will be six months older by next year but the teacher herself winked and nodded and said that perhaps Pearl might do better with ‘private tutoring’ one day each week so she only has to attend four days per week.
I think it is ridiculous, actually, to force all children to attend full time and do such difficult work at such a young age. I get that they are looking to the Taiwanese model of forcing as much learning down their throats at the earliest age possible, but, frankly, I would have thought that the Norwegian model was a happier one. The educational outcomes are equally high but instead they learn to read in an unpressured way when they are seven, have shorter days, less homework and more time in nature.
I flagged my concerns about next year. In pre-primary the kids spend a lot of time sitting down doing the kind of work that was previously done in grade one. Her biggest areas needing improvement is sitting quietly and fine motor control. This is difficult, in part, because her core muscles are so weak that sitting is difficult and her hands lack strength. The problems are something the teacher had already anticipated and we talked a bit about sorts of cushions to help her sit and the possibility of using an IPad if writing is too difficult.
Having listed her biggest areas in need of improvement, I should balance this by adding her biggest improvements throughout the year. Using the toilets, standing in the line if closely watched, playing with the other kids, having fewer tantrums. Just great social development all round really.
The one thing I did not find helpful is that pre-primary will be compulsory next year. She is still completely exhausted by two three quarter days at school so I can’t imagine that she will cope with five days. (I see no other children in the class who lie down on the ground at the end of the second day and say they need to have a sleep.) Of course she will be six months older by next year but the teacher herself winked and nodded and said that perhaps Pearl might do better with ‘private tutoring’ one day each week so she only has to attend four days per week.
I think it is ridiculous, actually, to force all children to attend full time and do such difficult work at such a young age. I get that they are looking to the Taiwanese model of forcing as much learning down their throats at the earliest age possible, but, frankly, I would have thought that the Norwegian model was a happier one. The educational outcomes are equally high but instead they learn to read in an unpressured way when they are seven, have shorter days, less homework and more time in nature.
