Why are parents so anxious? One reason is that the competitive pressure in today's society is really great. Only by cultivating children from an early age can we walk in front of our peers. Another reason is that many parents think that the earlier children's education begins, the better. Early education should start at an early age to promote children's intellectual and physical development.
However, there is an old saying in China called "Encourage children to grow up". Parents are eager to instill all kinds of knowledge into their children from an early age. From the perspective of child psychology, this is not necessarily a good thing.
Which is more important, children's growth, maturity or learning? Many parents have made a mistake! They think that learning should start as early as possible, and the earlier the better.
Gesell, a famous American psychologist, once did an experiment on this issue. He found a pair of identical twins under the age of one to do experiments, in order to prove which factor has greater influence on the child's psychological growth and development, maturity factor or learning factor.
Seguer used the method of training children to climb ladders in the experiment, which was specially designed for the experiment. After seeing the ladder, the twin brothers were interested in trying to climb it, but both failed. Later, when his brother was 48 weeks old, Seigel began to train climbing ladders.
My brother spends 10 minutes every day training how to climb, how to put his hand on the ladder and how to lift his leg. At first, my brother was clumsy. He often forgot his next move, put his hand on the ladder and then stopped moving. After a month's training, my brother finally got the hang of it and could climb the ladder by himself.
From the sixth week of my brother's training, my brother also received training, 10 minutes every day. I continue to consolidate my previous training achievements. The difference soon came out. The younger brother who started training in 53 weeks made obvious progress faster than his younger brother. After only two weeks of training, my younger brother can climb the ladder as flexibly as his younger brother. At this time, my younger brother has been training for five weeks, and there are two weeks of consolidation exercises.
The two brothers have different training time, but they are similar in climbing ladders. Later, Seigel continued to train the twins in piling, digital memory and words. He found that although the children who received training first surpassed the untrained children for a period of time, once the untrained children received the same training after reaching a certain age, the untrained children would catch up with or surpass the children who received training first.
Therefore, gesell believes that the mature biological structure of individuals plays an important role in the growth and development of children. Before a child matures, there is a preparation stage, which is a transitional stage from immature to mature.
Children in this period are still unable to learn something. If they learn early, although they can master skills through a lot of repeated practice, there will be difficulties in learning, slow progress and unstable learning effect. There may even be a decline in learning motivation and interest.
Based on his own research conclusions, gesell put forward his own view on parenting: maturity is more important in children's growth, and children should respect objective laws and wait patiently for their "maturity" in early education.
Gesell's "maturity" refers to the period when children have the ability to learn something. For example, the "language sensitive period" of 2-3 years old is the mature period for children to learn to speak. 1 year-old, children can babble like their parents and even call their parents. Some parents have systematically taught their children to speak since this time, but they are not.
After repeated training, children around 1 can even master some simple sentences. But if children learn to speak systematically from the "language sensitive period", the effect will be better. 1 year-old children may take several days to master the same sentence, while two-year-old children only need one day.
Therefore, the early education of children should be based on objective laws.
How can parents help their children grow up better?
(1) Don't develop children's intelligence too early.
John Brouers, an American educator, pointed out at the international symposium on "Early Education and Brain Development" that the view that 0-3 years old is the most critical period for infants' intellectual development is too one-sided. Overexploitation of the intelligence of infants under 3 years old is not conducive to their growth.
Developing children's intelligence prematurely is a bad thing for their growth. In essence, developing children's intelligence too early is tantamount to forcing them to accomplish what they can't do. It's like forcing children to use chopsticks when their hand muscles are immature. In the long run, children will have resistance to learning and even fear, which is very unfavorable for future development.
2 know how to master the "sensitive period" of children.
Compared with other periods, children are more likely to learn certain knowledge and behaviors, and a certain aspect of psychology develops most rapidly. This period is called "sensitive period", which was put forward by the famous educator Ms. Montessori. Such as "language sensitive period", "action sensitive period" and so on.
Parents should know how to master their children's "sensitive period", carry out targeted education according to the changes in the sensitive period, and provide corresponding environmental stimuli, which can get twice the result with half the effort. For example, children in "language sensitive period" are very sensitive to language learning. At this time, teaching children to learn to speak can often be mastered quickly and skillfully used.
It is better to teach people to fish than to teach them to fish.
Einstein said: It is more important for children to learn to think and judge independently than to acquire knowledge.
If parents want to help their children grow up better, they should pay attention to training their thinking. Otherwise, no matter how much knowledge education is, it is only knowledge, and it can't make children form the ability of independent thinking and judgment. In short, parents should attach importance to the cultivation of children's thinking ability from an early age, so that children can draw inferences.