All About Family FDC

If you were in school…

You’d be tracing lines, not wearing leaf crowns. 🍁

You’d be making cookie cutter fridge projects, not designing your own robots from the recycle bin. 🤖

You’d be coloring in the lines, not picking apples and making apple pie. 🍎

You’d be sitting in a circle, not giggling under a blanket fort with your brother. 👬

You’d have 15 minutes of recess, not unlimited freedom to explore your world. 🌲

You’d get tardy slips, not weekday camping trips. 🏕

You’d be singing everyone else’s songs, not making up your own. 🎶

You’d be taking tests, not climbing trees. 🌳

If you were in school…

I might get more done. I might make more money or be caught up on laundry.

I might have more time to read my own books or take a bath without little feet in the water.

But if you were in school….

What a beautiful life we would both miss out on. 💚

——

* This is a letter I wrote in 2019 to my then-5-year old Dez on the year he would have entered Kindergarten.

He has always been one of the most imaginative and creative souls I’ve known… I cannot imagine how crushing a school experience would have been for him.

I got teary-eyed with gratitude when this showed up in my memories this morning. He’s 8 now and fully immersed in his beautiful life, indulging in his interests and passions as they arise.

Sharing this this morning in hopes that it inspires you too. 💚

Exactly.
via Kristen RB Peterson + Co.

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This is my most widely shared post. And rightly so, it’s an important one. These are “prewriting patterns”, with the age at which children are developmentally ready to achieve these patterns listed below them in years and months. Being able to process visual information and produce a movement in response (e.g. copying these prewriting patterns or letter formations), is known as “visual motor integration”. ⠀
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Note that an X is not typically achieved until 4 years 11 months, and a triangle at 5 years 3 months. If a child can’t form these basic shapes...then they probably won’t be able to form letters. ⠀
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It is quite concerning then that there are 3 year 7 month olds starting formal schooling, where they’re expected to write. Not only are their visual motor integration skills not developed enough, their hands are also physically under-developed. In addition, recognising letters, understanding phonics and beginning to read are all needed in order for a child to write meaningfully, skills which children starting kindy typically don’t have. We also know that when a child learns something that doesn’t hold meaning, it‘s unlikely to stick. ⠀
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So if you have a 3-4 year old who spontaneously asks or attempts to write letters, that’s great; otherwise, there is no need to initiate or worry about this. Unfortunately there is a misconception, particularly with the way that the current curriculum stands, that earlier is better. Earlier is not always better.⠀
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