Child's play

I don't know how to think about this.

Something in me militates against regulating toddlers' play. Scientifically, I know that studies are mixed; some finding that early childhood education pays benefits, some finding that it can destroy children's desire to learn.

The problem is that no one approach is likely to fit all. Anyone who takes an interest in the theory of education is quickly impressed by how ineffective comprehensive schemes of education tend to be. I am so little convinced of the value of them that I consider school to be most useful as a venue for socialisation and acculturation, and simply for being with peers, and only as a distant second a place for actually learning. From my own experience, I know that I learned far more, and far more that was valuable, on my own initiative, both during my schooling and since, than I ever did at school. Some of the things I learned then meant nothing to me because of the way I structure my understanding of the world, and have only come to make sense since -- particularly in science, which is far too fragmented at high-school level to be much use. I learned about chlamydomonas and amoeba but not how they fit a broader system in biology. Or if I did, it didn't sink in. I know much more biology now than I did then, and I understand better what I know. I needed a far broader education than I received. Some kids need something much narrower. A common complaint was that they could not understand how what they learned applied to their world.

Standardised education makes a lot of sense to the beancounter mentality that prevails in the British government. In industry, if input is of quality A, and the process of manufacture follows carefully defined standards, the output will be of quality B. A and B are measurable and, within tolerances, will be expected to correspond. It works when you're making widgets because of course if the process is not varied, the outcome shouldn't be. What can affect the output is the quality of the tool used in the process, or its functioning. So the thinking in education is that if you feed in a controlled input, the output will be measurable in the same way it is in an industrial process. What's being ignored is that the process itself can vary -- kids don't respond in the same way to the input -- so that what you measure at the output -- the test -- is not necessarily commensurate across kids. Also, of course, there are other inputs. Just as some industrial proceses require a precise environment, and can be affected by changes in temperature, say, or by the introduction of impurities in an unclean environment, so kids are affected by their surroundings, and in particular, by their home environment.

Of course, there is another side to the coin. Zenella attends a kindy that is of very poor standard. It took us a while to realise it, and by the time we had, we had the dilemma of its being too late to switch her without upsetting her by cutting her off from the friends she had made. It's only a small part of her week in any case, and we keep her away more than we put her in. But we know that they don't offer good-quality childcare and if she were younger, we'd have moved her from fear that it would do her harm. I suppose you feel five-year-olds are more resilient than two-year-olds when it comes to that kind of thing. It wouldn't necessarily hurt if kindys like Zenella's were encouraged, or even compelled, to provide a certain quality of childcare. I know that the more libertarian among us would say, well, if you don't like their approach, move her somewhere else, but the problem with childcare is that it's too scarce a resource to allow much shopping around -- I mean to say it's a seller's market -- and it arguably harms a child to be moved from place to place. And, as I say, you don't realise after a few days that there's a problem. It gradually dawns on you. Kids of Zenella's age are not communicative about their educational experience (apparently, they cannot be; they don't generally have a good picture of "how my day has been" and consequently can't communicate it -- in any case what is salient to the child isn't necessarily as important to you as it is to them).

posted by Dr Zen @ 2:56 pm