Hear Them Out - The Star newspaper

This appeared just last week, and was very timely cos my son's in the 5-year-old class. I agree with a lot of what she says because I see it first hand!

“Do your work properly. No talking in class.”
At least in my son's class, the teacher is a bit more understanding than the other two classes. Kids are allowed to talk while doing their workbooks...quitely and for a short while anyway! My son's class would be considered chaotic compared to the two other classes! In the other classes, I hardly hear the kids and they're very often seated quitely in their chairs (a bit like robots). I'm not saying one teacher is better than another. Each have their strengths and challenges I'm sure ...and my son's class has FOUR other challenging kids excluding my son and excluding the girl I talk about below. It's just that we've passed the first decade of the new millenium and we're still using the old education model?!

"losing the Bill Gates, Picassos, Montessoris and Albert Schweitzers of the future".

There's a girl in his class who's different from others. She usually doesnt sit with the others and pay attention to the teacher, nor repeat what the teacher asks the kids to repeat. She knows her stuff. She also sees things differently. Today, she picked up a tiny piece of scrap paper (about 8cm x 1mm), showed it to me, then said something to which I didnt pay attention to (cos teacher was teaching and I didnt want to get into trouble for encouraging her to talk!). Shortly after, she showed me that piece, but twisted up, and shaped into a "toy" walking cane, and she confidently started her story about it. She seldom talks to her peers. When we were about to go home, she peeled off some paint from the door (!), twisted it a bit, and said it's the bird that she had said earlier that she wanted to give me.

I had noticed this girl back during the holiday programme, but thought that she had behavioural issues as the teachers were struggling to get her to do what they want her to do. Teachers were using a harsh tone with her a lot then. Now, I see her in a different light. She was probably really bored and hence 'acting up' cos the holiday programme was more like baby sitting. I think her potential has been overlooked by the school. I'm not blaming the school, mind you. It's just so sad to see that potential wasted! Refer to the paragraph in the article below about "losing the Bill Gates, Picassos, Montessoris and Albert Schweitzers of the future".

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Wednesday, January 20, 2010


Childwise by Ruth Liew

Hear them out

Young children are active learners with unlimited potential.

LOOKING at five-year-olds and six-year-olds sitting in rows of desk writing away in their workbooks makes me wonder how little we know about their potential. If we really respect children for their ability to think and value their ideas, we would be sitting down with them and asking them what we should do instead.

Most teachers and parents consider conversations with children frivolous and a waste of time. After all, what do children really know at such a tender age? The adults should be the ones deciding what they should learn and how they learn.

It is sad to note that almost a decade into the new millennium, we still have so little trust in young children as active learners. If we focus on what they are paying attention to, we will learn that they are serious about their learning. They do have ideas that matter a great deal.

The adults in their lives – parents and teachers – want to make sure that they learn and develop the intellectual skills that they need in life. They teach children to “bark” at print rather than to enjoy reading.

During one parenting seminar, a mother asked me: “How many hours in a day should my child spend on reading before he makes the breakthrough to knowing how to read independently? Should I send him to additional reading classes after kindergarten?”

Learning to read takes more than just drill work or learning the sounds to make words. Children have to gain many experiences first before they start to master the ability to read and write.

One six-year-old boy proudly read in English, the title of the book I was holding at storytime. After reading aloud the title, he turned to me and said in Mandarin, “See, I can read.” When I asked him to speak to me in English instead of Mandarin, he turned away without saying a word.

This little boy, like many of his friends, had his head filled with information deemed important by the adults who control their lives. He learned how to read but he did not fall in love with the language.

Before they can read, children need a chance to mess around and to experiment. They need to delve in meaningful conversations with adults to share their ideas and opinions. Give them opportunities to reflect on what they know and what they think. When they realise that they can use writing to express themselves, they will happily do so without much persuasion from adults.

This kind of teaching and learning is not happening in many preschool settings.

When I saw a five-year-old child holding a pencil and drawing a line between one picture to another, I wonder what was going through his mind. He could be thinking about the cartoon character that he liked so much. Or he could have quite a bit to say about his visit to the zoo during the weekend.

The little boy turned to his friend sitting next to him, who was drawing circles instead of lines. He muttered something to him and both of them ended up laughing. The teacher walked over and reprimanded them: “Do your work properly. No talking in class.”

The mind of a child has unlimited potential. When we do not value individual differences or accept the ideas that come out of children’s interest, we lose the Bill Gates, Picassos, Montessoris and Albert Schweitzers of the future. Montessori believed that no teacher could teach a child what he can learn for himself. Our role as adults, their teachers and parents, is to support their learning.

We provide them with the right tools and opportunities to learn. We should not force them to learn when they are not ready or get them to merely follow what we set out for them. Just because children’s ideas are not part of the curriculum planned, they are far from being unimportant. Their ideas can help them build a bridge from existing strengths to new learning.