 |
| Fun in the woods. |
Laura Grace Weldon has an excellent post about reading and writing readiness on her website (thank you for sharing it Kortney!). Her main point is: teaching reading and writing to children too early is harmful and may lead to serious, long-term learning problems.
The information presented in Weldon's post comes from mostly new research on human brain development. However, the idea itself is nothing new. People who study educational psychology have known for at least twenty-five years that there is no value in early instruction for reading and writing.
I recall learning about a particular study (back when I was a student of Education at Syracuse University), in which one kindergarten (Class A) spent the majority of its time acquiring reading skills through direct instruction, while a second kindergarten (Class B) spent its time engaged in learning about the world around them through hands-on activities, stories, and play, and received no formal reading instruction
The initial results of the study showed that in the early primary grades Class A scored higher than Class B on reading assessment tests, indicating that early reading instruction provided a learning advantage to students. However, by fourth grade Class B performed as well as Class A on reading assessment tests, while scoring significantly higher in all other learning areas. Thus, the long term results of the study showed that early formal reading instruction did not provide measurable reading advantages over time, and in fact may have put students at a disadvantage by limiting their scaffold of learning experiences.
Why, then, does early reading and writing instruction persist in both schools and home schools, when we know that it provides no long term benefit and may actually harm students?
Picture this:
Your child is six years old and cannot yet write his name well. He can recognize shapes, but cannot draw them. He can recognize numbers up to fifty, but cannot write them. He recognizes most of the letters in the alphabet, but shows no interest in learning to read. His speech is immature.
Your brother's child is also six. She has been reading since age four and is able to write simple sentences. She can reproduce shapes and draw detailed, recognizable pictures. Her speech is articulate, and she expresses her thoughts easily.
- Which child gets the family's applause?
- Which child is "smart"?
- How do these perceptions affect the child's developing self-concept?
- What are the effects on future learning?
The child who is considered "gifted" at nine years old may grow to be an average twenty year old (trust me on this one--I speak from experience).
The child who is considered "developmentally delayed" may prove to be a genius (read the stories of Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein if you don't believe me), but most likely will grow to be someone with average abilities. (And, why are we so afraid of that?)
In other countries they take the results of scientific studies more seriously than we do. For example, when a recent study showed that cell phone use may negatively impact children's health, France passed legislation to protect children by regulating their cell phone use. Likewise, in Sweden (along with 47 other countries) children do not start school until they are seven years old. (Research shows that by age seven most children's brains have developed sufficiently for formal reading and writing instruction. to be of value.)
We need to look beyond children's abilities and truly value them for who they are rather than for what they can (or cannot) do.
- When telling other people about your child, tell them about what she loves instead of what she can do.
- Likewise, ask other parents about what their child loves, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment