Raymond Parenting

Blog

The “Right” Preschool for Your Child?

Posted February 20, 2012

French Immersion?  Montessori? Neighborhood?  At this time every year, parents are making preschool choices for September.  You may feel the pressure of deadlines, worry about programs filling up and yet aren't sure if you should line up overnight to get a spot or relax and see what's available in the neighborhood.

Before initiating the Infant Resource Center (1984) which later evolved into Raymond Parenting, I was involved professionally in the world of preschool education.  A great deal of research was being done at that time on how three and four year old children learn best.  The intellectual nuggets from that time when early childhood research was at it's peak, confirmed that children learn best when motivated by curiosity and opportunities to make discoveries of their own.  These recommendations still hold.

What kind of program will offer this for your child?  Often it will be the parent co-op in your neighborhood.  You will need to book an observation day (without your child along).  Look for interest areas such as a puzzle table, nature table, blocks centre, reading corner, a model kitchen, trucks, dolls, a basket for dress-up clothes and a sand/water table.  As children arrived they can move to any centre that catches their interest.  A parent volunteer (or hired assistant) may be at a table, perhaps offering a ball of play-dough or a dress-up hat to an arriving child. The teacher will draw the group together for circle time, later for snack time, and there will be a low-key flow to the rhythm of the morning.

In this video, you'll see the amazing way an interested adult can subtly facilitate learning, conversation, discovery and mastery for young children.  (Video is from The Perry Preschool Project run by HighScope in Ypsilanti, Michigan.) To watch, cllck on either video on the right hand side.

But what about a Montessori preschool ?  A Montessori preschool, if it is being true to Maria Montessori's model, is strongly adult-directed as opposed to child-directed. There are no actual toys in a true Montessori classroom, which disappoints some children.  Instead there are 'work stations' where children choose a tray of learning materials.  The 'work' on this tray must be arranged and put away before a child may find another tray to work on.  I recently observed children at the tracing/cutting table cutting dinosaurs out of paper. One child began to "roar" his dinosaur toward another child's dinosaur.  I was happy to see this normal interaction - but an adult immediately arrived to correct and quiet these children and get them back to work.  A true Montessori is a quiet classroom, tempting parents to hope their possibly rambunctious four year old will learn manners and self-discipline here. Here is a Montessori classroom video.  There are many more ways to be in trouble in a highly structured classroom and children need to start their day shaking the teacher's hand and saying good morning on the way in. As you'll see in the above video, there are some children who appear to be thriving here.  But as you watch, notice there are "right" ways and "wrong" ways to use the materials.  "Wrong" ways are corrected.

I should mention that many excellent, play-based preschools in Calgary use the Montessori name (why, I wonder) but are offering true child-directed learning under highly sensitive teachers who are not trained in the Montessori method.  So keep your eyes and ears open for one of these. Instead of reading the preschool's words about play-based learning, however, you'll need to go see for youself before making a decision.  Words can be misleading.

French Immersion may be your choice, of course, depending on your language goals for your child.  If you speak French at home and your child is already familiar with the language, this could  be a good fit.  Even in this case however, you should note that an Immersion preschool will have an agenda (teaching French) which inevitably makes it more adult-directed.  If your child is not already familiar with French my bias is for him or her to attend an English preschool first, requiring only one  new variable to adjust to at a time. 

My recommendation is to visit an inexpensive preschool without a big name and which is close to your home, first.  If it looks like a fun, relaxing room for play with a warm, friendly teacher, I think you'll be in the right place. Ideally and developmentally, consider two, half-days for your 3 year old and 3 half-days for your 4 year old.  Kindergarten is soon enough for 5 days in a row of school.

Now, I hope you will weigh in with your opinions of my opinions...on the subject of preschools.  Tell us which type you chose and why you are/are not happy with that choice for your particular child.

| Subscribe to email updates for this blog

(0) comments

Read more...

Filed under: Interesting Parenting Matters, Play

---

Childhood Safety Risks

Posted February 5, 2012

In his book Paranoid Parenting British Sociologist Frank Ferudi states that "It is the exaggerated sense of children's vulnerability that justifies contemporary obsessions about their safety.  Today, safety is no longer about taking sensible risk.  Parents are bombarded with advice that demands that they create a risk-free world.  Every parent must have experienced that nervous grab in the stomach as you watch your child balance to walk along a wall or struggle to climb a tree.  The words 'come down now' are on your lips becaue you KNOW that a fall will hurt and you also know that a fall is possible.  But you also know that if your child doesn't fall, he or she will have demonstrated a new skill in physical agility, learnt a new lesson and gained a new sense of confidence."

 

Slivers, bumps, scratches and scabs used to be expected during childhood.  Parents took them for granted.  Not any more.  Parents have been made to be scared and are constantly being warned that a sliver may fester, bruises may look suspicious to a nurse or other health professional and a nasty scab could have been avoided if only you had demanded that a new playground be built at your school. 

In his book Last Child in the Woods, Richard Louv tells us that the (US) Soccer Association has 3 million members.  Obviously, demand for laying fields is up, just as it is in Canada.  Expenditures on parks are falling.  When parks are funded, the designers focus on reducing liability.  Encouraging a variety of play styles is less of a priority.  A flat patch of grass or artificial turf (Seattle) may be perfect for organized sports, but not for unstructured or natural play.  When a park is graded to create a playing field, children gain soccer capacity but they lose places for self-directed play.  Louv tells us that "Research suggests that children, when left to their own devices, are drawn to the rough edges of such parks, the ravines and rocky inclines, the natural vegetation.  A park may be neatly trimmed and landscaped, but the natural corners and edges where children once played can be lost in translation."

Two children in my life made up spy games in our park - inside the bushes that surround the outer edge. One day, when the city had sent a crew to trim up those bushes - we walked to the park and the kids wondered what happened!  "Why would they do that?"  That day they just sat on the bench with me, contemplating how to be spies - with nowhere to hide.

I have more to say about this wonderful book, Last Child in the Woods  by Louv, but first tell me your thoughts. 

 

This week's seminar: Sleep from Now On.  Tuesday, February 7, 2010

 

| Subscribe to email updates for this blog

(0) comments

Read more...

Filed under: Interesting Parenting Matters, Play

---

Ways to Play With Your Child Without Becoming The Playmate

Posted January 30, 2012

Most parents want to spend playful time with their child but  become uncomfortable when they've played so well that their child can't bear to have them leave.  Suddenly, the toys are boring if no adult is involved in the play.  If this sounds familiar, you may have slipped into the role of playmate and need help to get out.  This happened to me.  While I really enjoyed watching my child engaged in play, I prefered observing from a distance.  My eyes tend to glaze over if I am the playmate.  Yet, even back then,  mommy guilt would send be back in again.

We need to realize that many things we do with and for our child can be done in a playful manner, and it's quite possible that some of these things are more important for our kids than having us on the floor as their endless playmate. 

1. Look at books together.  Every time you read a book and share the pictures, your contribution to a child's well-being goes as high as the sky.  This counts as play!
2. Play together with sounds, words and noises through the day when you think of it.  Fingerplays, rhythms and songs are major motivators for language learning.  You hold the key.
3. Your child watches you do jobs around the house.  Soon they want to "help." This slows you down but this all counts as playing.  Playing at being a dad or a mom with responsibilities.  
4. Do playful diapering, dressing and bathing.  This constitutes playing with your child.  It works well...until they being to protest diaper changes!
5. Clean up things together.  Toys, newspapers, spilled stuff, etc.  This is called playing house.  "Oh, look.  We need to move these papers into the recycling box."
6. Based on your attentive observations of your child's interests, design the play environment to to be rich and vary it a bit, every few days.  Then, remove yourself so the real play can begin!
7. Introduce good things like puffed wheat in a small basin on the floor in your kitchen.  Measuring cups and other containers to allow "cooking" and...eating.
8. Instead of more toys, use your (playful) money to buy real things for your child such as small but real tools, children's metal gardening tools, small broom, tea set, dolls with clothes, water toys for the bath, costumes and hats and a real box of band-aids to play with.

Now, as faciitator of your child's play - you are in a position to rise above the guilt that comes in the form of a whine "Why can't you play?" 

You are the best parent ever!

 

 

(photo by Tom Clare)

 

| Subscribe to email updates for this blog

(0) comments

Read more...

Filed under: Daily Routines, Play

---

Page 1 of 6 pages  1 2 3 >  Last »

Parenting Seminars
and Support