Why is it that society today has so much difficulty just letting kids be kids? Let them develop at their own pace, discover the world and all the wonders around their little bodies in their own way.
Yes, adults are smarter and perhaps do know what’s best for their children. But not all the time. Adults almost ruined sports for kids by getting too involved and pushing the kids to the point where many of them got fed up and quit playing games they had loved.
This week the Early Years Study 3 recommends in-school programs for two-year-olds to “maximize their development.” Two-year-olds? In a school setting?
We already have numerous pre-school and pre-kindergarden programs that provide daytime care for children and allow parents the chance to work to earn the paycheques necessary to pay the mortgage, car payments and put food on the table.
These existing programs all have merit and are essential in today’s society. They provide an environment where kids learn to develop friendships, are free to explore and learn in a semi-formal setting that still allows them to have the fun that every child is entitled to.
So we have to ask, what is behind the recommendation of this latest study? It will appeal to a certain segment of the population who subscribe to Dr. Fraser Mustard’s theory that when it comes to brain development “it’s all over by five.”
Mustard’s 1999 Early Years Study that called for parenting centres to support families, starting at pregnancy and providing health services, preschool programming, parenting resources and child care, was right on the mark. It helped change society’s thinking about helping young parents and children.
But this latest study appears to be more about money than children. One of the lead authors, Kerry McCuaig, has been arguing for some time for more ways to get kids out of their parents’ care. The reason?
Money.
Putting kids in early childhood development helps the 70 per cent of Canadian mothers who work outside the home to earn paycheques that McCuaig says not only provide for their families, but grow the economy and contribute to the tax base.
“We rely on those mothers and their labour — if they didn’t work, the economy wouldn’t work …”
An added bonus, she says, is it would provide more jobs for early childhood education graduates.
Jobs and the economy. Is that what this is all about? If so, how does that make you feel? Innocent two-year-olds, still learning to walk and talk, being used as pawns to save the economy for you and I? We screwed up the economy and now we’re using kids still in diapers to try to save it?
We’ve screwed up the economy, now let’s screw up our children also? No thanks.
The existing programs available can be improved, no question, but when it comes to pushing two-year-olds into even more formal settings, well, who are we really doing this for? The parents? The economy?
The focus has to remain the children’s welfare and development and not economics.
