Teaching our Youngest Students Classically

Begin by making a more careful study of your pupils, for it is clear that you know nothing about them. ~ Jean-Jaques Rousseau 

• “My daughter is very bright, verbal, no delays, but I worry she is going to fail, because all her friends can write their names. I just assumed she would learn it all in K. What am I doing wrong?”

• “My child is very intelligent, but doesn’t seem motivated to want to do school.”

• “He won’t sit down long enough to do the reading eggs, and I am so frustrated.”

• “This handwriting is awful, how do I get my child to improve?”

Besides the frustration, the common factor from these questions was that the child was always under the age of six. 

A response I recently posted to such a question seemed to resonate with 64 ‘likes’:

He is five years old.

Five year olds are supposed to play.

The "best" school systems in the world don't teach reading until 6 or 7.  

Let him play.

Teach him to observe the outdoors, how to wonder at the stars, to dance and sing, recite nursery rhymes for fun, cook with you, and fold towels. Play great music, expose him to great liturgy, and teach him to love God. Let him climb trees and build strength, model with playdoh and develop fine motor skills. Read bedtime stories and fun stories out loud to him every day. Read by yourself (model).

Try again when he's 6.

That's also a Classical approach!

All the best!

And yet - the question repeats in one form or another on social media pages, in groups, forums, and in the messages in my in-box. Parents expect and often demand that their very young children are academically challenged with a ‘rigorous,’ compartmentalized curriculum. Whether it is in order to be prepared for what they consider to be a ‘good’ Classical education, or so that they may be prepared for advanced academics and able to get into the ‘good’ universities, there is a common desire or even demand that these children perform.

This is a misconception that must be overturned, and the sooner the better. Every child development text and neuroscientist out there affirms that young children need to play. They are simply not developmentally ready to sit down and learn to read, write, and calculate in the forms and methods so commonly proposed in many schools and preschools today. 

For years, there was a push for ‘early literacy,’ ‘head start’ and federally funded ‘universal PreK.’ Now, comprehensive studies are not only showing that these initiatives do not work, but that initial advances were not only erased, but those children eventually wound up academically behind their peers and exhibited more behavioral issues and dysregulation overall. An extensive Vanderbilt study (Farran) showed that while students who experienced an academic PreK showed more “school readiness” through 3rd grade, by sixth grade, they were doing worse, and were also more likely to get into trouble in school. We are not just talking about minor infractions, but serious suspension-warranting behavior. So - a decade-long study involving a sample size of almost 3000 children showed a measurable and statistically significant negative effect on the academic and social development of children. 

The education arms race seems to have backfired. 

Badly. 

Many expressed shock, but this should not have come as a surprise to anyone. While the scientists and Vanderbilt mulled over the study, we already know that the Silicon Valley giants send their children to tech-free Montessori, Waldorf, and Classical schools. Brilliant minds such as Stanislas Dehaene have written entire books on how the mind forms and how we learn to read, mapping out in meticulous detail how our brains develop and work, always coming to the conclusion that young children are not created to be academics. In Finland, children start learning to read at age seven. Finnish students outperform students from other countries on international assessments, including the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), and are better readers in the long run.

Curiously enough, the great minds of the past already knew this, without modern science or brain scans or studies. In 400 BC, Plato rejected the notion that babies are born as a blank slate, and instead suggested that every soul possesses the power of knowledge and a mind ready to learn, and that learning was naturally acquired through engagement with the environment: in other words, for young children - through play. “Play” was not a trifling matter to the ancient Greeks. Indeed, the proper forms of music and ritual were of the greatest importance. Properly guided play was essential as this would ultimately form children into good adults. 

It is through play that children are best formed. This is not only common sense, it has been proven repeatedly over millennia, through observation, science, studies and more. It is only the maniacal drive to ‘get ahead’ and the demand for ‘rigor’ that pushes an agenda that is ultimately harmful to our children.

PreK, done well either at home or at a school, is truly the foundation for a child’s life, and it is not complicated. No-one needs a PhD to understand!

To begin, there must be a better understanding of what ‘education’ actually means. To “educate” does not mean teaching how to read or do algebra or debate, it means to form a body, heart, mind, soul, and character. The education of a young child is to expose them to the world, and teach them to understand their relationship to it. It means guiding a child in how to respond to rain and sunshine, anger and delight, butterflies and growing things, how to share and be kind, how to respond to disappointment or grief, to wonder and delight, to sing and to dance, to recognize beauty and the holy.

Charlotte Mason, the brilliant British classical educator, wrote that young children “should be out-of-doors in all possible weathers. They should watch animals, birds, insects… tell about all they see… [and] play in sand heaps.” Her description of a PreK included short periods of time in which children could explore, learn to wonder, hear beautiful stories, learn nursery rhymes and how to sing songs, to dance and to jump rope. Children should learn to describe what they see, retell information, become familiar with the stories of the Bible, draw and do crafts, play in sand and mud, make and do. 

Dr. Farran, after a decade of study, came to the conclusion that, “We might actually get better results from simply letting little children play.” The Ancients and the Classical educators of today already knew that.

A study published in Frontiers in Psychology showed that children who had experienced a play-based preschool such as a Montessori or Classical program “were significantly more likely to have better psychological health — in particular, higher levels of emotional stability and life satisfaction.” Furthermore, it turns out that such children “showed significantly improved reading skills” compared to peers who had attended an ‘academic’ program.

It makes sense. 

Experiential learning teaches children to become problem solvers, how to manage frustration, and how to overcome challenges. Building that tower of blocks, lacing the board, stringing beads, or matching magnets are all educational activities.

A well designed preschool has the calm, quiet, and quality toys that teach young children how to focus and concentrate, how to persevere and finish a task. Moving and sorting colored beads into their correct containers with tongs, or setting up a domino row to knock down is teaching profound lessons. Screens, TVs, videos, and worksheets do not have this same effect. From the Academy to American Pediatrics to University studies, the data shows that screens are harmful to children’s sensory development…and yet we see videos and iPads proliferate in elementary schools. Why is there any wonder about the rise in attention disorders and children’s inability to self-regulate?

The preschool in which children hear beautiful stories read out loud that teach morals, character, and wonder - fairy tales, parables, nursery rhymes and poems - is laying a firm foundation for children in what quality sounds like. Expand that with beautiful artwork on the walls - not kitsch, not cheap Chinese-printed Amazon cuteness, but great art…and add in music, too. Real music, not the synthesized dumbed-down twang that passes for ‘children’s music’ today. Honor the incredible creation that is a child’s heart, soul, and mind, and give them Mozart, Beethoven, Satie, and the great hymns. Give them folk songs and children’s songs that have withstood the test of time. Teach a child to sing, to dance, to clap in time, and you have given that child a gift that will last a lifetime. Dr. Nelson, professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School explained that children are not passive recipients of information, everything they experience is an interaction. We need to create the best interactions for children - and they are never worksheets and drills at ages three, four, or five.

A good preschool education provides an atmosphere of encouragement and growth, and teaches children to adapt and manage. That cup knocked over - do we fall down and cry, or do we figure out how to clean up the sand? The wind came through and it began to rain, do we give up on the walk, or put on a rain jacket and find a new way to explore? Children given such an environment develop curiosity, adaptability, bravery, and grit. That will help them if they ever enter the corporate world more than a forgettable worksheet at age four. 

We are seeing a once unthinkable  increase in young children who lack core strength, physical stamina, and struggle even to sit upright for long periods of time. Let children run, climb, and play. Scandinavian children climb trees in preK, and in the USA, we remove monkey bars and climbing gyms. The physical and emotional fitness that develops as a result of hours spent outdoors running, climbing, and playing is worth far more than any minor academic ‘head-start.’ Teach a young child to hold a crayon correctly for later development, but don’t force writing. Some will be ready and willing to write their names at three, and some won’t until they are five or six. Neither one is ‘better’ or ‘worse.’

Someone once questioned me how a classical school could possibly know how they are progressing without standardized tests. There is no test that can measure the swelling of a soul when it hears music done well at Mass, or when a string ensemble executes a Pavane to perfection. And yet, in the long run, the outcomes are evident: children are emotionally healthier, and they are achieving well as they reach adulthood. It is utilitarian and dehumanizing to expect young children to produce a portfolio of work (and indeed, to measure even older children on only one test as a benchmark). Instead, let’s give our youngest students the tools they need to become whole human beings. Let them play. Read to them. Teach them to sing. Expose them to great liturgy. Help them delight in the world around them. Guide them to become contented and well-mannered little people. Let them fall in love with God. It is immeasurably good.

After all, when that child reaches the gates of heaven one day, St, Peter will not ask them to write their names or pen an essay. That is not what the end goal is, is it?

Let the children play. The best preschools do so well, let’s encourage them!