I know a blogger who would be very interested in this topic but unfortunately she is too busy finishing her thesis at the moment.
I overheard this conversation on the bus recently. The background to this conversation is that a new playgroup has just been opened in our compound. The previous one was run by a British ladies and the current one is by a Canadian of Middle Eastern origin.
Some of the ladies were discussing if they would or would not send their child to the play group. One lady said that her child is only one and a half years old and therefore would not be able to learn anything. She said she would send her daughter when the daughter is three or four years old. "When we were young we didn't have all this but look at us now. We are OK. So why should we send our children to all this things? Why must we make them study early? They should just relax."
Another lady replied, "Well we want out children to be better than us."
I remember Atenah telling me about some cultures that don't stimulate their child before the age of two because they do not believe that the child would understand.
And I have seen many Malay families here who do not see the importance of sending their children to kindergarten. Also Arab news published a statistic that less than 8% of children in this kingdom go to kindergarten at all.
Very different from the Europeans. They send their children to the playgroups as soon as the play group would take them. They feel that it is very important for their children to be socialized especially at a young age. My German neighbour insist on meeting twice a week if not more often so the children could play together.
And my view? I personally have seen how the Little One has benefit from the social interactions with other children and other adults. And her experiences and exposure she had when we went to vacation recently has made her more aware of her surroundings. But she is inherently a very curoius child who seek social interaction. She would wave or seek attention of other children who passes by, or have I taught her that way?
Nature or nurture?
1 comment:
my daughter is 13 months old and i had only recently started sending her to a playgroup. dulu-dulu takda playgroup tapi kalau tinggal kat kampung, i remember we kids always played together. mock wedding lah, masak-masak, police n thief. what a simple life it was in the past.
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