One would think that with the
increasing focus on providing children a good grounding at a young age so as to
allow them to learn and achieve more in school, preschool would be necessary
and even mandatory in all states, including California. Surprisingly, this is not so. In
California
parents and guardians are not required to register their children for
kindergarten or preschool because the children are not of legal age and so
cannot be mandatorily enrolled in an education establishment. According to
estimates around 50,000 kids, (10% of preschool or kindergarten aged children)
skip enrolling each year because state law does not make education compulsory
till the age of 6.
But while the law does not
require parents to send their children to preschool, most of them do or at
least want to. And finding the reason why is not hard. In a world that is
getting increasingly competitive, giving a child the right grounding and start
in the learning process is something that will stay with him or her for the
rest of his or her life. Many educators find that first graders who have not
been to preschool or in kindergarten are behind other children in the same age
group when it comes to academic or social development. These children are also
more likely to flunk a grade sometime during the elementary school years.
Starting Too Late
There are many reasons why
children are not sent to preschool. In the case of California many are from immigrant families
who are unfamiliar with the American educational system and cannot navigate
their way through school district bureaucracies. Or parents’ work schedules do
not mesh with preschool timings. In some cases children are put into day
care when they are infants and when parents find that the children are happy
there, they do not think of moving to preschool later because they are not
aware of the differences between daycare and preschool.
But preschool does not exist
just to provide parents with a place to send their kids before they are old enough
for school. It is a place where a child is given the tools and encouragement to
begin the learning process in a way that is pressure free and fun. The aim of
preschool is to waken children’s innate curiosity and show them the
satisfaction that comes from finding the answers to the questions they have.
Thus the acquisition of knowledge, even at a very basic level, becomes an
interest and not a chore that is to be avoided whenever possible.
Children who learn because they want to are usually academically ahead of
those who learn because they have to.
Just like adults, children
can become set in their ways and if the concept of learning does not become
part of their lives at a young age, the difficulty in accepting it as a part of
life increases with age. Children are malleable, physically and mentally, when
very young and this is the ideal time to encourage them to focus on learning.
Unfortunately, many parents do not appreciate this or feel that by sending
their children to preschool they are depriving them of their childhood. This is
completely incorrect. In preschool there are no judgments or competition to see
who is learning more. All that is done is that the children’s cognitive
abilities are stimulated to enable them to want to learn. And being in a preschool
with their peers means that the transition from home to regular school is not
as traumatic as it can be for those who begin their education only from the
first grade.
So even
though preschool is not mandatory in California,
parents who want to give their children the benefits of a happy and fruitful
school life will be well advised to consider sending their kids to preschool.
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