Teacher, Leave Them Kids Alone!

I just read this article online. I had to express myself. My first reaction was a knee-jerk and rather annoyed one. However, my second reaction was more controlled and contemplative.

My child is neurodivergent. But that’s not all that he’s about. He’s an eye-rolling, shaggy-haired teen. He was the most beeyootiful baby in the whole word (IMHO). He is honestly the center of his father and my universe. He is my only child and naturally assumes the center-of-the-universe position. The child is funny, wacky, annoying, and sensitive. In a nutshell, he is a child growing up into an interesting individual.

When we enrolled him in playgroup, we weren’t expecting much out of it. He was just under two years old, and the session lasted only for 2 hours. I dropped him off and came back home. After having my coffee and sorting out the house, it was time to pick him up again.

The entire playgroup experience was so he would socialize. Meet his peers and learn some skills which we couldn’t teach entirely at home. He also go annoy someone else for 2 hours before my shift kicked back in 🙂

Many little kids under the age of 5 can appear to be “different.” Even some kids below the age of 7 may seem that way. Either they talk too much, or not enough. They are too hyper or too quiet. They are not always very well-balanced. The reason for that is simply this: they are just learning about the world. They are trying to understand things beyond their immediate environment. Until now, this environment comprised of mom, dad, and home. They are quite honestly in the process of getting “made”.

Their reactions to the stimuli they face around them can change from day to day if not minute to minute. Unless there are very strong physiological social and behavioral markers that set them aside from the rest; it can be quite premature and damaging to come to conclusions about who they are and how they might turn out. Especially by people who aren’t trained to notice and comprehend everything. Let alone diagnose things which fall into the ambit of ‘listening issues’

My child’s class had a quiet corner (substitute naughty) for the kids who needed a timeout but might not have understood the concept entirely. Needless to say, TO’s tiny butt used to be parked in those chairs quite often! And how did he circumvent being in the “quiet corner”? Simple! He merely enticed the rest of the kids to come and sit with him so the erstwhile quiet corner became the regular class, with the teachers being left behind on the carpet doing the activities by themselves. A prime example of turning a minus into a plus if there ever was one.

So when I come across articles which quote “teachers” and early childhood caregivers et al citing “issues” like “running around during circle time” I really have to wonder what where they expecting from the children in the first place. And when kids aged 3 years or so are asked to leave their small social groups where they have just started to interact, engage and start to feel safe, for reasons such as not knowing how to ask a question (raise your hand while sitting quietly somewhere and wait to be called on), I believe those adults are in the wrong line of work and should go find things which require the utmost precision and order since they will *not* get that from preschoolers. Ever. And if they do, they should turn around and run since it’s probably the Children of the Corn playing out in real life.

I was a Gymboree Play & Music instructor and parent for a while. I attended the program with my child from the time he was 10 or 11 months old and I started conducting the programs for kids who were still in the infant stage sometime down the line. Some of the tots would sit and stare googly-eyed at Gymbo (the Gymboree mascot), others would want to tear his hair out, some would want to chew on it and with each kid a new action would come into play.

Our job was to understand the child’s reaction and help mold it to the desired action which was to explore, learn and appreciate. And if the child’s extent of appreciation was to just clap their chubby hands together while they drooled, then so be it! Imagine a line of impeccably attired, hair properly combed babies, clapping at the right places, smiling when appropriate and not being all over the place. Stepford much?

So when I get to know about toddlers and other tots getting expelled from preschools because their behavior was “inappropriate”, I have to wonder which Kool-Aid these educators have been drinking. Because being messy, fussy, weird, silly and being an unpredictable ball of emotions and actions is what such little kids are all about!

Nuff said!