09/15/2017
Just a little rant - the school system in general as well as the State of MN 'gently urges' parents to start their children in a curriculum based preschool program as early as 3 years old - with desk learning mixed in with learning the usual fine motor skills concepts / I am not against this push nor am I for it - children spend SO much time behind a desk why start sooner than they have to ... young children learn best through play and imaginary learning - how to use their brains outside the box and adapt to different scenarios that aren't always black and white ... today we went for our usual walk - the kids found an area where leaves had fallen - they spent well over 30 minutes in this leaf pile collecting leaves, making piles with teamwork, scooping them in to buckets and then using a stick to make 'soup', they learned their colors by talking about the different colors of leaves, they practiced their counting skills when putting them in to their buckets and they even learned their letters when we came across a few sticks shaped like letters (Y, L and I) and even other letters if you added an extra stick - learning opportunities are all around us - children notice them much faster - so let your littles 'Play' - the odds are very high they're learning!
