Early Learning !

There are many in the community that joyfully remember those years of enjoying their childhood until they reached the age of five or six, when they were first required to attend primary school. Few of todays children experience that period of freedom because of the mantra that it is never too early to start the learning process.

Today we live in the era of either pre-school or long daycare and that can start when the toddler is still in nappies.  With an election looming, both sides of politics are in the cross hairs of the Early Learning and Care Council of Australia  ( ELCCCA ) which insists that Australia is below the average participation rate for three year old compared with the advanced world.

A long time ago, conventional wisdom recognised that some children were ready for school at lot earlier than others and commencement was staggered accordingly.  The needs of the Australian economy have changed to the point that two income families are almost a necessity and early learning needs are being masked by the provision of childcare to make that possible.

In New South Wales, 200,000 families use daycare and 40,000 use preschool.  We seem to be fast heading into a regimen that insists that preparation for regular school starts at age three or four and the child that has not had this advantage will not attain the excellence gained by others.

Staffing this child care need is a fast expanding career choice which will eventually have well established attainment levels and rewarding pay levels, but we need a clear indication of the objectives to be gained.  Are we trying to get a head start on academic learning or are we using this opportunity to train children to be civilized and avoid the anti social traits so evident in the adult population  ?

Little kids are at the formative stage of their lives and in many cases standards taught in child care will clash with the attitudes held by their parents.  Kids in a class with other kids with different skin colours are unlikely to be so deeply swayed by parents who display that form of rejection.  Much of the prejudice that does such harm in the community can at least be softened in this early leaning process.

In the past, school was simply training people for a very predictable future life.  At the end of their   school days they would choose a vocation and work in that field until they retired,.   It is now anticipated that the average person may change careers a number of times over their working life and each time they will need to retrain as each of these new careers needs deeper skills.

What we need now is the ability to change course and learn new skills when that becomes necessary, but probably of even deeper importance is the ability to avoid conflict with the other humans we will encounter in our changing career paths.