Family education, school education and social education are three ways to educate people and three pillars to protect children's growth. If we compare the functions of family education, school education and social education in children's growth with tree structure, then family education is the root, school education is the stem and social education is the branches and leaves. The roots of trees are buried deep in the soil, but they are invisible but important. The water and nutrition absorbed by roots determine the height and width of a tree. The absorption and extension of roots are just like the education and resources that families can provide for children. Children are sometimes a mirror of parents, and parents can see the importance of family education to their children through their minds and personalities. Some scholars and practitioners attach great importance to the role of family education in children's development. The famous Coleman report believes that the main reason for children's academic differences is family background differences, and there are countless related documents.
If family education is compared to tree roots, then school education is the trunk and social education is the branches and leaves. Whether a tree can find a place where species gather in the jungle depends on whether its trunk can send its branches and leaves to more sunny places. The wider the branches and leaves covered by a tree, the more sunlight it can absorb, and the more natural energy that can be transformed into vitality through photosynthesis. The broad coverage of branches and leaves is just like giving children a broader vision in education, so that they can understand a pluralistic society, the more they can cultivate their broad minds and broad patterns, and the better their growth can be.
Trunk is a very important tissue connecting roots and leaves, a carrier of nutrient transfer, and a support for sending branches and leaves to the sun. Just like in education, the school is a place to spread knowledge, a place for children to live and form social development, a carrier for social resources to act on education, and an assistant for students to form their understanding and judgment of the world. Only by climbing high can you see far. The higher the trunk, the less branches and leaves are covered by other plants, and you can absorb energy more effectively.
From the perspective of system theory, roots, stems and leaves cannot develop independently and need to cooperate with each other. School and family together shape a person's social acquisition ability, so school, family and society need cooperation. In particular, home-school cooperation is needed. When educators in schools become partners of parents and relatives in the family, they will create opportunities for developing children's social skills, emotions and academic abilities.
Education is a public topic, and everyone can express their opinions, because most people play the role of educators and educatees. Even if they don't work as teachers, most people will accumulate some experience as educators during their parenting years. However, people often ignore that education is also a highly specialized subject that needs awe. Teachers are typical occupations that need lifelong learning, and parents' cognition needs constant iteration. Therefore, the relationship between family and school is very important, which requires cooperation rather than conflict; Do the opposite, not the opposite; It needs deep collision, communication and participation, not like two parallel lines that do not interfere with each other. Practice tells us that the anxiety of many families and the increase of school management costs are all due to the uncoordinated relationship between home and school.
Recently, a best-selling book, Love, Money and Children, has been published, which analyzes the current family rearing patterns from the perspective of parents with the theory of economics. The word "chicken baby" is not unique in the context of China. In the United States, there are also "helicopter parents" hovering over the children's heads. "Love, Money and Children" wrote: When we were young, we often hung out together until the sun went down before deciding which friend to play with. No one will check our homework. Everyone is free to play and seldom takes part in organized activities. But the parents who grew up in such a tolerant environment later became more and more "helicopter parents". Therefore, the family's parenting style is often determined by the economic and social environment at this time, rather than the parenting culture that was exposed to when I was a child.
Family education can be roughly divided into: arbitrary, laissez-faire and authoritative. The survey found that children brought up by authoritative families have better grades, higher sense of happiness and self-esteem, are healthier, and are less likely to indulge in bad behaviors and habits such as drug abuse and fighting. The secret of the success of authoritative parenting style in shaping children and one of the important mechanisms of this parenting style is "parental participation". Parents should know more about their children's behavior and school life. They try to guide children's behavior with a rational and problem-oriented attitude, rather than making them obey through orders. Influence children's behavior by trying to shape their values.
In educating people, the family comes before the school. This is not only because parents are children's first teachers, but also because the earliest schools actually rely on the aggregation of clan and blood relationship, which we call religion or ethnology. The formation of modern schools is related to the social demand for a large number of skills after the industrial revolution, and also to the large number of women entering the workplace after the development of professional division of labor.
For a long time in the past, families and schools have their own functions, just like two specialized departments of society, but in the future educational concept, "breaking through the border" is a key word. The boundary of school education should be gradually broken. The place where students study is no longer limited to the campus, and the object of students' study is no longer limited to the teachers who work full-time in the school. Parents need to participate in the development of schools and the growth of students in various forms to form home-school education. Establishing an effective partnership between educators and families and creating an attractive and supportive atmosphere for learning can promote the development of children's academic, social and emotional skills.
Human growth is like the four seasons, and each growth stage has gone through a process from brewing, germination, growth to harvest. Parents and teachers often face children with physical and mental changes, and need to understand the characteristics of each season and the key words of children's development. Brew all the possibilities of children's all-round and healthy development in winter; Care about children's interests in spring and provide hope for their germination; Summer encourages all bold, independent and steady explorations, and autumn appreciates his bit by bit gains.
For parents and teachers, it is particularly important to learn to save energy for their children's future. First, we should exercise a healthy body. Good health is the premise of a healthy and happy life. Exercise is not only a good way to strengthen children's physique, but also closely related to children's cognitive development and character formation. Brain science research shows that physical education and mathematics have similar brain excitation areas, and similarly, excellent children in physical education also have the potential to learn logic well. The process of physical exercise is not only a process of physical exercise, but also can improve teenagers' social communication ability, shape teenagers' perseverance and cultivate their teamwork spirit and leadership. The second is a poetic life. Parents and children are "filial piety" when they don't talk about learning, and "chickens fly and dogs jump" when they talk about learning. This reflects a tense state of parent-child life, but homework and grades are not and should not be the only topics between parents and children. After the final exam of each semester, how to treat children's grades has become an anxious problem for many parents. Achievements involve education evaluation, and the education evaluation system in China is constantly being reformed. From June 5438 to June 2020 10, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council issued the Overall Plan for Deepening the Reform of Education Evaluation in the New Era, emphasizing the need to carry out comprehensive quality evaluation for students and overcome the guidance of emphasizing scores over quality. In fact, we should pay more attention to the process evaluation of education rather than the result evaluation of education. "Education is life", and getting along with parents in life is also a good opportunity for parents to influence their behavior by shaping their children's values. Winter and summer vacations mean that parents and children spend more time together. Parents and children can travel together, read poems, watch movies and enjoy time together. This is life and education. Third, we should have a peaceful mind. If poetic life is the art of getting along with parents, then a peaceful mind is the science of getting along with parents. Children's psychological development follows certain laws. Educators can understand these laws in the process of accompanying children to grow up, so that children can have a peaceful mind to deal with all kinds of differences and even conflicts. Kindergarten, primary school, junior high school and senior high school need to have a new understanding of children at each stage. Every new understanding will make parents and teachers reach a new understanding and have an impact on the subsequent parenting style. Children's psychological development has both individuality and individuality. Parents and teachers need to be familiar with general laws and study individual differences. Learn the tools of parenting and teaching in the course, and practice the art of companionship and guidance in getting along.
(Author: Fan Ai, deputy editor-in-chief of Peking University Institute of Educational Economics/College of Education, deputy director of editorial department of peking university education review)