Tag: Preschool

Let Them GrOw:

Letting kids grow through risky play.

Written By: Michele Carlson- Community Education Director

Last fall, I went on a trip up north to Canada to visit my grandson. We wanted to be outside as the weather was spectacular so we went to his school he could show his school to us and play on the playground.

It was fairly busy with neighborhood kids enjoying the weather at the playground since winter was just around the corner. My husband and I did a walk around with our grandson so he could show us the sliding rock and the huge sandbox as well as some of his favorite places in the tree filled playground. Once we had gotten the whole tour, we took a seat on the bench and watched him play with other children. Every child had an adult in attendance. Most adults walked around behind the kids and I heard a lot of , “Be careful.” “Don’t do that. You might get hurt.” Also, I heard a lot of rule telling such as, “Don’t go up the slide that way”. “Don’t throw sand.” There were lots of directions yet not much conversation.

In that I work with kids ages 3-11 daily, I find it interesting to see adults interacting with children. Especially, since lately, we have been having a lot of chats in the office about the lack of opportunity for children to have “risky” play. You may remember that sort of play from when you were a child. Activities such as climbing trees, riding bikes, and running through the woods having a make believe battle. Those were the days when you could arrive home for dinner with mud on your face, a skinned knee and dirt under your fingernails, and your parents would simply say, “Wash up for dinner.”

For many reasons, parents are now uncomfortable giving children the freedom to experience this type of play. In our efforts to keep kids safe, we have taken away a part of their childhood. In place of building forts and making mud pies, adults have put organized sports, music lessons, and tutoring in the lives of their kids. In this process, we have taken away children’s abilities to make choices for themselves. They rarely get to decide what to do when they walk outside to play. Mental health professionals will tell you people who have no control of their lives are the ones who live with the highest amount of anxiety. We are currently seeing the highest rates of anxiety in children than we have ever seen before. Coincidence? Probably not.

You may have noticed a significant rise in the number of preschool programs offering outdoor classes. This is likely a response to try to give children back some of the freedom they have been missing in their lives. The funny thing is adults created a new program to make this effort rather than give kids back time and freedom to choose what they’d like to do. Seems sort of ironic to me.

So what can we do? There is a pretty good chance that your child doesn’t know how to go outside and fill time without saying they are “bored”. Keep encouraging them to be outdoors. Take a walk and show them the amazing things you notice in the world like worm tracks in the mud, or animal tracks near your house. If you are lucky you may even find some scat to figure out what kid of animal left the tracks. Spark the passion of curiosity in your child to learn from their own environment. Let them look around (away from all screens) to see what intrigues them about the world. Model your own love of risky play by having a sword fight with sticks you find outside or challenging your child to see who can throw rocks to hit a nearby tree, or smash some berries without worrying if your shirt will get stained. Take those first steps. I promise you won’t regret it. See you outside!

Want to learn more about outdoor or risky play? Look for Free Range Kids online or in book form. Read Rae Pica’s book What if Everybody Understood Child Development? There are many resources in the chapter called Bubble Wrapping Not Required.

Are Teachers Writing a Book (about me)?

I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework.

Lily Tomlin

There were many times in the education of my children that I wondered why their teachers were so interested in me and our home life. I would get questions about whether my children shared a room, what kinds of foods did I offer at dinner, and whether or not we had a pet. I started to get a complex that teachers were stalking me!

Now that my children are grown, and I have the benefit of working in a profession alongside amazing teachers, I realize those teachers were doing their job. Every morning when parents come to drop off their children for preschool….. I see that kids don’t necessarily leave what’s going on at home at home when they attend school. I have witnessed many kids who are distracted by their home life, so much so, that their learning is diminished.

Kids are deeply affected by much more than we adults realize. At my school, I have witnessed kids melting down over a pet that is getting “fixed” during the day. First off, the children don’t think their pets are broken! Right?! Those same kids are likely to be wondering if those beloved pets will be the same when they get home from school. Children are famous for their creativity and this spills into their thoughts about situations we see as simple and small. Is Grandma going in for a little surgery? Kids won’t think surgery is minor , and they will be thinking about it at school.

When my youngest child was in third grade, my father’s Parkinson’s disease was rapidly affecting his health, and my family dreaded the inevitable result. Even with my effort to protect my 9 year old from the fear I had of losing my dad, my little boy felt the stress in our home. He finally gave in to the emotion he was experiencing and had a serious melt down at school. Fortunately, he had a teacher who knew something was off with him and she had asked me what was going on at home. When the meltdown began, she was ready and able to comfort my child.

Teachers are so much like parents during the school day. They wipe noses, give high fives, hand out discipline, and care about the welfare of the children in their class. When this light finally clicked for me, I no longer worried about teachers and their insatiable interest in my family. I willingly answered all the questions about family including all of our pets (including a chameleon). I realized that I wanted teachers to know who my child is. After all, who am I to think I don’t need help raising a human being?

I challenge you to provide additional information to your child’s teacher that will allow for the student/teacher relationship to be meaningful to your children. Raising children truly does take the effort of an entire community, so make your community large and make it a force to be reckoned with. Once you commit to growing the community that is helping to grow your child, the questions a teacher asks you at conferences or parent pick up won’t seem like such a big deal. I promise you….. teachers aren’t stalkers. They simply care about your child!