THE CHILD AND THE KINDERGARTEN

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXI, 11 June 1927, Page 2

THE CHILD AND THE KINDERGARTEN

(Contributed.)

The conviction thai education is primarily, if not entirely a matter ol Uio intellect., is still so widespread that the '"trirce It's" continue to |w regarded by mjny as the "jumping «$." point W child-training. Ton; often the'memorising of the alphabet ami of number sequence is insisted upon as the first duty of man, regardless of the fads that both arc meaningless lo the child, and that mere memory training leaves the higher faculties of 'the intelligence untouched.

'Modern students of child-nature have established beyond dispute that the memorising of abstractions is of little more use to (lie young child than it is to the parrot, anil that Froebel and Montessori were right in maintaining thai the cljild obtains the first knowledge of his environment through sense-impressions--learning through concrete media. Five slicks have a significance lhal may lie converted into an interest, whereas the figure 5 is unintelligible.

Both Froebel and Montessori stress the training of the senses that the child may benefit by training through the senses. Boll), insist, that this is the natural and rational method of development, and both point out thai lliis training should be given in (he first years of childhood. Each of the educators has prepared a set of didactic apparatus which can only benefit the normal child if used before the sixth, or at latest, the seventh year. Too often, however, the name "Kindergarten" has been applied to the lowest, form of the primary school, and merely indicates that a certain amount hf handwork and more or less free occupation is provided. Some of us, who know better, conform to this error for •the sake:of convenience. This misnaming of a preparatory form has led lo confusion in the minds of many parents. They regard the kindergarten as part of the school in the ordinary acceptation of the. term, so send the child at the age of 5i or 6 years—which is just about the time that the child should be leaving the kindergarten proper to enter the transition form in which kindergarten activities are combined with the first, direct lessons of the primary school. If the kindergarten in question is It real kindergarten the child of 5A or 6 will be using the apparatus which is intended for a much younger child, so it. will not be suited to his stage of development. When he enters the primary school a year or two later he will probably be behind other children of his own age, and the blame will be laid upon the kindergarten methods, whereas the child would probably have taken a good place had be entered the kindergarten at the age of three and passed through it and the transition class (a link between the kindergarten and primary school) before he was seven.

All kindergarten teachers should be trained for the transition and primary grades in order that they may carry out Froebel's maxim that each step in education should prepare for that which is to follow. Without such training it is difficult for the kindergartener to see the significance of her work and to have a clear conception of its connection with the child's later education.

Tito aims of Hie kindergarten, however, is not merely or even primarily to prepare the child for school work Its chief purpose is to provide, an environment in which a, child may develop its personality and its powers. The whole child-nature, its emotions, imagination and character, as well as its intelligence are to find food and stimulus. The training of band and eye, of the rhythmic sense, of the faculty for reverence of kinship with nature, and with bis fellows are to be aroused and developed. The average New Zealand mother is too busy to provide this environment, also the child needs the companionship of his contemporaries—children of like age and development. Hence the need of the true kindergarten from the point of view of the child.

Tli o need might bo urged (thongh_ in another article) from the point of view of the mother, who frequently combines the duties of cook, housemaid, seamstress and hostess with those of nurse and mother. What an immense relief it would be to her, if between the, difficult years of three and six her child might spend part of each day in an ideal kindergarten. How much fresher and more efficient, she would feel when he returned 1.0 her—how much more able, to give her attention to him when an uninterrupted period had enabled her to get through the heavier part- of her domestic duties; while it might help her to find a little leisure for that "quiet time" so essential to her if she is to preserve the self-control and high ideals which so many earnest-minded mothers set themselves to attain.