Contents
Developing groups for children in the “play with mom” format, preparation for school from the age of five and other circles create the illusion of limitless opportunities for the development of the child’s intellect. Unleashing children’s potential is a fixed idea for many parents. But what do we actually do when we develop a child. Explains neuropsychologist Maria Baulina.
1. Forced to meet expectations
Despite attempts to teach kids in a playful way, it soon becomes obvious to all participants in the process that “play” is just a beautiful name for ordinary training.
“Petenka, where is the letter “A”? Well, don’t get distracted! Put the typewriter in its place, come up to me and look at the picture, and then I will turn on the cartoon for you. In just a few days, Petenka, according to the laws of the formation of a conditioned reflex, learns a simple truth: if he names letters, adults are happy, if not, they are upset or annoyed. From this moment on, knowledge of the alphabet becomes the key to peace in the family, so the child’s interest in letters is steadily declining, and anxiety is growing. But, since the demonstration of lack of interest is fraught with conflicts with parents, the child gradually learns to portray enthusiasm and hide true feelings. The well-known pianist, and once a child prodigy, Polina Osetinskaya, very accurately writes about this effect in her autobiographical book: “I was not allowed to be or seem unhappy. I had to experience and radiate happiness every second. I learned this reverse auto-training, and no one has ever seen me unsmiling, sad. No one had any idea what was behind the facade.”
The child learns to want
Many parents and educators find that using toys or other brightly colored materials makes the activity more playful. But the most valuable thing in the game is the ability to set your own rules and leave it at any time, simply by saying: «I’m not playing.»
Effects.
By adolescence, or even earlier, the child will not know what he wants, because he will simply forget how to want. After all, his desire to do something interesting constantly encountered obstacles in the form of developmental activities. Then everything will happen as described by L.S. Vygotsky’s internalization mechanism: seeing how parents neglect his desires, the child himself will stop listening to them, and then completely suppress them so as not to be disappointed once again.
2. We deprive spontaneity
At the heart of the childish spontaneity, touching many adults, are involuntary reactions. There is a huge difference between having fun jumping to the music and performing dance steps on “one, two, three”, between listening to an English song and repeating the chorus many times in order to improve pronunciation. Regular and intensive developmental activities teach the child to act exclusively voluntarily, which is useful and justified for a primary school student, but premature for a preschooler.
What many parents consider «goofing around» is actually an important stage in emotional development. By jumping or crawling on a carpet with toys, the child learns to navigate his bodily sensations, recognize fatigue and regulate activity. Developing classes, on the contrary, involve maintaining a specially set posture for a certain time. Adults set the pace of the child’s activity and control his tone.
Effects.
The image of a clumsy teenager or adult in trousers up to the armpit and a tightly buttoned shirt is by no means a figment of the fantasy of comedians. The inability to achieve muscle relaxation and, in general, poor body control is associated with the inability to quickly respond to emerging sensations. To paraphrase a well-known joke about the centipede, we can say that a child was never given the opportunity to walk without thinking about the mechanics of his movement.
3. Decreased motivation to learn
Imagine that you spent several years building a career and almost grew to the position of CEO, and then you are categorically told that you need to return to the position of junior manager. In a similar situation, there is a child who has to re-learn in elementary school what he famously recited to guests from a stool at the age of five. This step back seems to him, if not humiliating, then rather strange, so it is difficult to convince the child of the need to listen to the teacher’s explanations and comply with his requirements. If the child realizes that most of the material is already known to him, he will miss the moment when new material begins, or will not be able to connect it with existing knowledge. In addition, the authority of the teacher will be lost, since the first grader will quickly get used to the fact that the words of the teacher are worthless.
The child is not motivated to learn
The “developed” child is not insured against star fever either. Accustomed to the praise of the teacher and the fact that his level of preparation is higher than that of classmates, the first grader will painfully react to a change in his status in the class.
Effects.
A child who believes that he already knows everything is deprived of the main motives for learning. He has no desire to catch up with stronger peers, no incentive to listen to the teacher and no opportunity to receive parental praise for re-mastering already familiar material. Due to age characteristics, he is not able to critically treat his disparate knowledge and, instead of systematizing them, he lets his studies take their course.
4. We interfere with the natural course of development
Unfortunately, many adults have very superficial ideas about the patterns and norms of child development. Some methods are still popular among parents that contradict long-established scientific facts. For example, Glenn Doman’s flashcards, originally developed for teaching children with neurological disorders, have become widely known, and then miraculously turned into a method for developing healthy children. Despite the fact that back in 1999 the American Academy of Pediatrics published an extensive report on the questionable results of using this technique, the demand from parents for its use is still great. As a result, the child is invited to passively look at the cards presented for a short time, without the opportunity to ask the adult any questions. All the scientific works of teachers and psychologists written about children’s cognitive activity, the importance of practical activities and role-playing games can, apparently, be handed over to a waste paper collection point.
First graders do not know how to express emotions and do not understand the feelings of other people.
The active development of the intellect at preschool age contradicts the most important law of child development—the heterochrony of the maturation of mental functions. This law assumes the non-simultaneous and uneven development of motor skills, the emotional sphere of perception, speech, thinking and other processes. During the first year of life, the baby manages to turn from a sedentary «caterpillar» into a cheerfully running person. At the same time, his vocabulary contains no more than 10 words that are understandable only to the closest people, and thinking still does not obey the laws of logic. What is the point of trying to teach a child to read or a foreign language at this age?
Effects.
Many teachers note that today’s first graders, having a high level of intelligence, do not know how to express their emotions and understand the feelings of other people. Perhaps this is because they had to memorize the names of the planets of the solar system instead of laughing at the tickle and playing “coo-coo”. In addition, most of the knowledge acquired by a preschooler is quickly forgotten. Thus, a foreign language “leaves” in six months if it is not used, which is repeatedly described in studies on the study of children of migrants and bilinguals (for example, in the work of Andrea Rossi from the Harvard Kennedy School).