Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Baaabies

Sometimes I want to have babies so I can experiment on them.

From Slate:
"Why Preschool Shouldn't Be Like School
New research shows why teaching kids more and more, at ever-younger ages, may backfire."



For the record, I went to a Montessori preschool and have fond but vague memories of it. There were different "stations" and areas where you could explore different things on your own schedule. For example, you could pull out a tray and practice pouring purple-dyed water from a pitcher into a glass and back, and a sponge to clean up any messes you made. I remember doing that one a lot--for some reason it entertained me. As an adult, I appreciate the fact that it taught hand-eye coordination, a basic skill that could be used at home (pouring milk), and that it taught independence. You could do it "all by myself," which also meant you were responsible for cleaning up your messes.

There were also letter tracing things. And we would have circle time to sing and do things together, like sing "Farmer in the Dell." But what I remember most is all those trays with different activities contained within. One last thing: We all put on our coats by ourselves using this foolproof preschooler method. The coat would be placed upside down on the floor. We would put each arm in our coat and then flip it over our heads, thus avoiding that "I can't find the spot for my other arm" problem that little kiddies have.