Originally Posted by redforever
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Exactly. I couldn't agree more. I am a former educator and I am of the firm belief that young children first and foremost should be allowed to be children. There is enough pressure on children already, dont force them to become adults too early.
Everything is being downloaded. Universities expect higher standards from those entering their system, so the learning of those standards is downloaded to the highschools. Then the highschools in turn download to the junior highschools. And they in turn download to the elementary schools.
And a lot of this pressure put on the school system is put there by the parents themselves. All the parents today want "super" kids. So they enrol them in all kinds of programs at ridiculously young ages. They make sure their kids are exposed to everything that is out there, so that they dont miss out on anything and they will have an "advantage " later on in life.
Take a look at hockey. My son wanted to play hockey when he was young, I really think he only wanted a nice pair of hockey gloves, but none the less, since he expressed interest there, we enrolled him in some hockey program for his age group. They had 3 practices and one game per week and my son was only 7 years old!!! That is silly. No wonder so many kids get burned out by the time they are 12 years old. I think Wayne Gretzky is onto something when he says, let the little ones go out there and skate and have some fun. Organized stuff can come later on in life.
And that is how school should be too. Let the kids have some fun, learn some basics and leave the calculus etc for later on. I firmly believe there are some concepts, particularily in the maths and sciences, where you need to be a chronological age before you can master it. Sure, there are some very gifted children out there, but according to the normal bell curve, they will be in the minority, maybe 8% at the most. So then, why develop a curriculum that 8% can manage and perhaps manage without stress, while the other 92% struggle, have tons of homework, and fall prey to stress and pressure. Do it the other way around. Develop a curriculum that can be learned by most, one that will meet the needs for them later on in life, one that will meet the needs for other studies that they go on to. And then, put some efforts into developing programs for those who are gifted and need the extra challenge. Worst case scenario is for these type of children to be bored. And they bore quickly.
Kids today have stress that was not there 20 or 30 years ago. Today, many families need both Mom and Dad to work cause housing etc, takes a bigger chunk out of income than it used to. So there are a lot of "latch key" kids out there. They are dropped off early, they come home to an empty house, Mom and Dad come home exhausted. And then the kids are driven here, there and everywhere to all the extra curricular activities they are enrolled in. And then there is the homework too. Everyone is tired, exhausted, worn out.
And we wonder why in Alberta the suicide rate for youth is so high. Go figure!!!
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