I'm sorry, baby. I shouldn't have let the myth of a famous school get you into trouble.
For several days in a row, the cold winter morning, eat a good breakfast dressed up Mu Mu, along with the outside child to go out, I picked up the camera at the door and called her to turn around, she gave me a big smile, which is her smile before school, is so naughty, but also full of confidence, so that I have long been in the heart of the haze of the famous school of thought, instantly have a clear sky of rain like a smooth and cheerful.
In order to pick up Mu Mu this school smile, I really did a lot of hard work, but also experienced a period of famous school myths worry and not easy process, and now in retrospect God gave Mu Mu this famous school myths bumps and twists in the school journey, is not a bad thing, because that profoundly wake me up in the child learning and growth of the road, I have to look at the matter of the famous school myths.
In October of last year, three-year-old Mu Mu began to clamor to go to school. Seeing that she was so eager to go to school, I enrolled her in a well-known and established kindergarten, which was so popular that it only offered all-day sessions on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and based on the good reviews of the school, I didn't give it much thought and thought I'd just send Mu Mu Mu for a try first. At first, I thought that Mu, who is optimistic and outgoing, wouldn't have the so-called "separation anxiety process.
Anyone who knows Mu Mu knows that she has been a smiling, generous, witty, and loud girl since she was a baby, and is even a bit of a tomboy, and loves to make friends, so going to school is something that can only be described as a "joyful" experience in her unknown world.
On the first day she was dropped off, she was very happy, and greeted her new life at school with a big smile on her face, and she really didn't feel any sense of separation from her mother. But I didn't realize that when I went to pick her up in the afternoon, she ran over to me in tears and said she was so tired, so tired, so hungry, so hungry. Her two lines of tears I heartache to the extreme!
I asked the teacher why she said she was so tired and hungry. The teacher replied, "Because she didn't take a nap and she didn't eat!" The teacher's cold response immediately triggered my mother's instinctive alertness. Mu Mu, who has always regarded eating and sleeping as the most important thing in her life, why did she stop eating and sleeping when she came to a new environment?
When I got home, I fried some rice for her, and she finished it in one big gulp, and fell asleep on the couch in no time. That night was the first time she woke up crying in the middle of the night since the day after she was born, and I began to worry that Mu Mu didn't seem to be adapting well to the school, so I wanted to let her try it out for another month and keep a close eye on her school life.
The next month or so of schooling was a mixture of going to school happily, coming home crying, and eventually not going to school at all. She couldn't even go to her favorite children's class, the Little House Party, because she had a fear of going to class. She practically clung to her parents and would never leave, she grabbed them and stopped growing and learning, her shadow was so huge that even I was covered by it, my mood was like the winter weather in those days with dark clouds. (Recommended reading: Kindergarten Myths, Is Mixed-Age Teaching Good? )
Every time I asked her why she didn't like school anymore, I got some answers from her tender speech, and I pulled out the threads and scrutinized them as follows:
First, I'm so hungry and tired.
She just arrived at school feeling new and strange, meal time, she just want to play with toys do not want to eat, the teacher could not let her sit down properly to eat, they starved her stomach, she could not sleep in an unfamiliar environment, the teacher also ignored, let her go to the office to play. I discussed with the teacher, the teacher only asked me to go home and communicate with Mu Mu myself, but a three-year-old child just left her parents the first few days of school really need someone to give her a sense of security and properly soothe her to eat and sleep, instead of just letting her starve and letting her get tired, and she just got to the school and lost the sense of security of the home, how is she going to continue to learn?
Second: I haven't seen you in a long, long time.I admit that I was too eager to put Mu Mu in a full-day class, and it was hard to get her used to the rules of school with a two-day-a-week program. I raised Mu Mu until she was three and a half years old, and she barely left me for a second, so it was really too sudden for her to leave me at school for a whole day right away! I'm sure she spent a lot of time at school thinking about me and waiting for me. It's not easy to wait for someone, let alone a three year old. She is very open to learning in a new environment, but she still needs me with her most of the time. Therefore, I think the half-day program from Monday to Friday is the most suitable for Mu Mu.
Thirdly, I don't understand what they are saying.Mu Mu's ability to hear and speak single words in English is limited at the moment, and since most of her life is still in Chinese, a sudden change to an all-American environment would make it more difficult for her to get into a group setting. I don't want her to encounter so many obstacles and lose so much confidence at the beginning of her learning process. A child this young who is constantly blocked will be forced to shut down and resist growing up, and it will accelerate the loss of her innocence and good nature. At this stage, I just want her to have a loving and secure environment to expand her self-confidence to explore the outside world, so that she can grow up slowly and steadily without retreating or resisting.
Based on these three points, I took Mu Mu home from the famous kindergarten and suspended her from going to school, even though the director asked me to let Mu Mu try for a while, emphasizing that! This is all just a child's reaction to just leaving their parents to go to school, will adapt will adapt. But I know my child, I know her needs, I can not ignore the child crying, she cried for a reason, I need to listen and understand the child's heart.
In fact, I have thought for a while that the child facing a new environment, was bound to learn to meet the pressure, their own independence, to overcome anxiety, can not be because the child cried and cried, on the connivance of the child said do not want to do not want, but the premise is that she is only three years old, the first thing at this stage, I hope that she will be able to feel a sense of security, and then come back to talk about the norms of the group, and then come back to talk about the learning benefits of the classroom environment and the schedule arrangements, it is clear that can not give her enough security, but also to give her a sense of security. I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to do that, but I think I'm going to be able to.
Later, after two months of deliberation, I chose a bilingual family kindergarten for Mu Mu that was highly recommended by my church sisters as a place full of love. The first day it rained heavily, I took Mu Mu to visit the school. Mu Mu, who had the shadow of going to school, was still emotionally unstable and temperamental when she arrived at the new school, not wanting anything and not cooperating with anything. Even though there were many angelic and kind children inviting her to play with them, and even though there were lively and enthusiastic teachers leading the children in songs and dances, Mu Mu was still resisting again and again, and this was really contrary to her original true personality.
It's a good thing that I'm not a big fan of this.
I don't know what to do anymore. When the tour ended, she cried and said she wanted to continue with the class, but she couldn't cooperate with the activities. I awkwardly dragged her away in the pouring rain with no shoes on (she cried that she didn't want to wear shoes, she wanted to stay in the class), and when I got to the car, she insisted on not buckling her seatbelt, so I couldn't start the car.
All of a sudden I was at my wits' end, I lost my mother's strength, my emotions collapsed, and I bawled my eyes out more like a child than she did, I really suppressed it for a long, long time, and I couldn't help but show my helplessness in front of my child. I can't help but show my helplessness in front of my child. Often at this time, I can only keep praying in addition to crying. After half an hour of crying in the car between mother and daughter, Mu Mu finally told me she was sorry, and that she was willing to buckle up and go home with me.
When I got home that day, I was so frustrated that I could hardly speak. I didn't realize that God was working on my prayers during this time. Two mornings later, the kindergarten had run out of places for Mu Mu to attend, but suddenly a child transferred to another kindergarten and a place opened up. I felt that this was God's providence, so I decided to let Mu Mu give it another try, and enrolled in a half-day program from Monday to Friday.
On the first day of class, KJ and I took her to the kindergarten, and in the morning, there was a kind grandmother taking care of the children. When Mu Mu went to the kindergarten, she didn't want to go to school again, but the grandmother patiently held her hand and coaxed her to go to the backyard to play in the sand, and she suddenly felt relieved.
The first time I saw this, I was able to see it in the backyard, and I was able to see it in the backyard, and it was a great experience.
The next day, she did better in class. When she got to school, she was brave enough to say bye bye with a smile on her face, and spent the whole time in the classroom with her classmates singing, dancing, praying, drawing, and learning how to write. Now, when I go to pick her up, I can hear her high-decibel giggle before I get to the door, and she says bye bye to everyone! I'll be back tomorrow!" That's her! She is so generous and outgoing, and there is always so much joy coming out of her heart with her laughter, that she was able to participate in the children's programs at church and at home as happily as ever, and she doesn't cling to us anymore.
After this experience, I took a moment to reflect on the process of finding a kindergarten for Mu Mu, and realized that parents should not choose a school based on the so-called "highly rated" or "prestigious" myths, but rather, they should try different types of kindergartens with their young children. The first thing you need to do is to put aside the school environment, the curriculum, and the philosophy of education, and to make sure that your child has peace of mind, and if you have peace of mind, then you have confidence, and then your child will naturally follow the norms of the group, and will love to learn.
Every child has a different personality and is suited to a different school. When a child is young, all parents can do to help is to choose the right environment for their child to learn. When they enter the school in the first month, pay close attention to the child's reaction, if a long period of one or two months, separation anxiety has not been improved, school is not happy, then you have to consider changing the school, try not to force her to adapt to the environment for a long time.
The ancient proverb of "pulling up seedlings to help them grow" is not without merit. Forcing young children to face the pressure of adapting to a social group early on can cause them to withdraw or distort their character. A suitable, warm and loving environment is the only way for them to grow up better and healthier. Reprinted with permission from Von Von at home, the source of the original article is the experience of choosing a kindergarten for Mu Mu
.