Why Preschool is So Critical

For every young child, there comes the day when they must enter into the education system, to begin a 12-15 year stretch of formal education, which will become the gateway into a career and adulthood. Educators understand that the formative years, from 1-7, are critical, as we form our values, beliefs and habits, and preschool is your child’s very first glimpse of the outside world, therefore your choice of school is important.

Education

As many educators over the centuries have discovered, there are indeed many ways a person can learn, and even today, there are more than half a dozen educational strategies that follow certain core beliefs, and when you are looking at preschools for your child, identify their core beliefs and ask questions about their program.

Experiential Learning

From a young child’s perspective, hands-on learning is by far the most effective way to learn. Exploring with touch, sound, taste, movement and language is the ideal way for a 3-year old to begin to make sense of the world around him. Luckily, there is a preschool in Bangkok that believes in experiential learning, and they have flown in early learning specialists to head up their team, and their curriculum revolves around the 5 senses, where the kids learn through touch, taste, sound, sight, movement and language.

Learning By Discovery

Early learning programs fully understand how a young person learns, even the teachers are not ‘teachers’, rather they see themselves as facilitators of the learning process. In some educational systems, the teacher will come right out and ‘tell’ the students why something is the way it is, which is the traditional way to ‘instruct’ the student, yet with a learner centred program, the facilitator asks the students, what they think, and why they think that. This develops analytical skills, and the kids arrive at the right answer through their own efforts, rather than being ‘instructed’, and these learning tools will prove to be invaluable in their lives.

Essential Social Skills

This is another area that the learner centred approach focuses on, as the children must be within a culture that promotes equality and exhibits love, kindness and compassion. Each child has both the right and the opportunity to express themselves in the way they wish, and peer learning is actively encouraged.

The Love of Learning

Learning should be fun; if it isn’t, then we won’t have the motivation to learn, and any successful preschool would be fun-based, with happy young learners who develop a life-long love of learning, and that is an invaluable asset for anyone. When a child goes through their formative years in the right environment, they quickly develop life skills and are able to self-learn, which gives them an enormous advantage in the later years of formal education.

When you are looking for a preschool for your child, make sure they have the right core beliefs about early learning, and your child will acquire the necessary skills to realise their fullest potential.