Apparently having taken little heed of the intense criticism fired at the initial introduction of a “baby curriculum”, the government has provoked a new riot amongst pre-school education experts.
The likes of early years guru Penelope Leach are up in arms over government proposals to introduce formal reading and writing lessons to pre-school children. From September 2008, the Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum, will become statutory in all early years settings. The curriculum will include teaching children between the ages of three and four to write sentences, ‘…interpret phonic methods to read complex words and use mathematical ideas to solve practical problems’.
Methods which may well be welcome in primary school, this level of formal learning at three is unequivocally premature. After all, we do not refer to these types of childcare settings as “playschool” and “pre-school” for nothing.
Once again, characteristic of New Labour’s brand of policy, the issue is less about the misapplication of pedagogy and rather to do with the government’s inability to resist controlling the minutiae. Although the Early Years Foundation Stage will apply to non-compulsory nursery provision, all providers, state, voluntary and private, will be legally required to implement it.
As ever, this central dictation will be accompanied by bureaucracy, as child psychologist Richard House, one of the signatories of an open letter to the Times Education Supplement pleading a reversal of the curriculum’s application, complains: ‘It's just not appropriate to manage everything - this audit mentality is coming into the early years stage and it is going to be disastrous.
‘If the practitioners have to look over their shoulder to tick boxes and are monitoring children, the quality of relating with children could be severely compromised.’
A lesson which could never have been too early for New Labour to learn, is that an iron grip from the centre is always ill-advised.
Comments (2)
Far be it from me to support any initiative from this government, but isn't all this stress on play and development rather old hat? Think of John Stuart Mill, reading Homer by the age of five; Sam Johnson devouring his father's books in latin when little more than a toddler; Mozart already started on his symphonies; Michelangelo sucking in the chisel with his mother's milk; Bernini doing much the same. Doesn't their grace, their easy mastery - so far surpassing most of their competitors and rivals even to this day - suggest that the sooner we bind the infant mind to knowledge and skill the better? Away with bug-eyed Blake and all his loony schemes! Back to discipline - discipline from the cradle!
Posted by Simon Denis | December 3, 2007 3:36 PM
Posted on December 3, 2007 15:36
Nowadays, my wife who is specifically trained for childcare and education for 0-7 year olds and has many years experience running the nursery department of a school, is no longer allowed to hold such a position as she is not a teacher. Instead, she must report to a newly-qualified teacher with no experience and no training for this age group.
Posted by HJ | December 3, 2007 10:27 AM
Posted on December 3, 2007 10:27