Cause analysis and countermeasures for the primary schoolization of preschool education

In 2010, the State Council promulgated the "Several Opinions on the Current Development of Preschool Education", which ushered in a good opportunity for great development of preschool education. As governments at all levels attach importance to preschool education, some problems that have long plagued the development of preschool education, such as insufficient number of kindergartens, arbitrary fees, access standards, and supervision and management, are expected to be gradually resolved. However, in the development process of preschool education, an issue that deserves more attention is the tendency of “primary schooling” of preschool education. If this problem is not solved, preschool education will seriously deviate from the right track and affect the healthy growth of one or even several generations.

The so-called primary schoolization of preschool education refers to moving the teaching content and management model of primary education down to kindergarten, requiring children in kindergarten to attend classes, do homework, observe discipline, and even take exams like primary school students. The "primary schoolization" of preschool education is more prominent in private kindergartens than in public kindergartens, and is more serious in large classes than in middle classes and small classes. In some private kindergartens, elementary school courses such as pinyin, literacy, arithmetic, and children's English are taught from the middle class. Not only are classes arranged in the morning and afternoon like in elementary schools, but children are also given homework and even midterm and final exams. Some kindergartens even complete the basic Chinese and arithmetic knowledge in the third grade of elementary school before children enter elementary school.

The famous educator Rousseau once said: "Nature hopes that children will be like children before they become adults. If we disrupt this order, some fruits will ripen prematurely and they will not be plump. It’s not sweet, and it will rot quickly. That is to say, we will create some young Ph.D.s and senile children. Although children learn pinyin, arithmetic, English and other courses in advance, they will not lose at the starting line. In the long run, this kind of advanced learning will cause great harm to children's physical and mental health and personality development, and even cause irreparable losses. For example, letting children learn to write too early will cause children to have hunchback and scoliosis; reading and writing for a long time will affect children's vision development and easily lead to myopia; lack of time for games and activities with peers will directly affect The socialization of children harms the development of healthy personality in children; children learn primary school content in advance and then repeat the textbook content when they enter the lower grades of primary school, which will make them lose interest in learning, etc.

There are many reasons that lead to the primary schoolization of preschool education.

(1) The competition for admission to examination-oriented education in primary and secondary schools spreads to kindergartens

Although my country proposed the implementation of quality education in the 1980s, the central government repeatedly issued various policies, regulations and measures, but the test-oriented culture in basic education has not changed at all. Basic education curriculum reform was implemented in 2001, hoping to promote the process of quality education. Unfortunately, more than ten years have passed and we have summarized many experiences in curriculum reform. However, primary and secondary school students have heavy academic burdens and high pressure to enter higher education. No substantial changes have been made. The new basic education curriculum and quality education are weak in the face of strong competition for higher education. Competition for exams and entrance to higher education has spread from the college entrance examination to kindergartens step by step.

In order to increase the enrollment rate, schools at all levels select good students at all levels. Primary school and junior high school are compulsory education, and primary school students can advance directly to junior high school without taking exams. But the reality is that some junior high schools, especially high-quality junior high schools or "key classes" in junior high schools, can publicly organize examinations to select outstanding primary school graduates. Similarly, in order to cater to this selection, some primary schools have to select students from kindergartens. Children must pass a variety of tests before entering the first grade of primary school, and the content of the test happens to be primary school subject knowledge. The admission rate of some prestigious primary schools is even lower than that of the high school entrance examination and the college entrance examination. According to the report "Preschoolers are under pressure to enter higher education", a primary school with an enrollment of less than 300 students had 3,000 students enrolled. "Getting into a prestigious primary school" has become the only goal of kindergartens. Under the guidance of this goal, learning pinyin, learning to write, learning arithmetic, and learning English have become the main content of kindergarten courses, and they can't be taught even if they don't want to.

(2) Catalyzed by the concept of “Don’t let your children lose at the starting line”

I don’t know when the slogan “Don’t let your children lose at the starting line” has become widespread in society. To spread. Some parents believe that "starting early" or "starting fast" will definitely lead to failure, so they push their children to primary school courses early.

Even if the kindergarten does not teach, parents will make demands to the kindergarten. Only when they see that their children can learn pinyin, arithmetic, recognize words, and memorize poems every day will parents feel at ease. Driven by such strong "market demand", kindergartens have no choice but to introduce the teaching and management model of primary education to cater to the needs of parents.

(3) Off-campus education institutions deliberately "build momentum" and add fuel to the flames

Some early childhood education and training institutions in society, driven by economic interests, open various so-called "targeted" Training classes and “kindergarten transition classes”. In order to attract students, in response to the parents' mentality of "hoping for their children to become successful" and "hoping for their daughters to become phoenixes", they vigorously advocate the importance of early education, and even launch some utilitarian and false education propaganda to parents. It seems that not allowing children to learn ahead of time will delay their lives. Coupled with the fact that parents lack scientific understanding of preschool education, and are dazzled by various propaganda slogans and slogans, with the mentality of "learning is better than not learning", batches of parents send their children to preschool early. The journey of “primary education” has begun.

(4) The quality of kindergarten teachers is not high and pre-school education is simplified

Pre-school education is an education that lays the foundation for life for children aged 3 to 6 years old. It is an enlightenment education. To implement the principle of "combination of education and education", the main form of education should be entertainment and education. The "Guideline for Kindergarten Education (Trial)" points out that preschool education "should lay a solid foundation for children's lifelong education." The "Kindergarten Work Regulations" clearly stipulate that the working principle of early childhood education is the mutual penetration and organic combination of physical, intellectual, moral and aesthetic education; games are the main activity and education is integrated into various activities.

The nature, tasks and form of preschool education determine its requirements for the quality of educators. It requires teachers to love and understand children, follow the rules of children's physical and mental development and cognitive characteristics, create various activities, comprehensively use questions, explanations, observations, demonstrations, games and other methods to penetrate humanities, science, language, Educational content such as art integrates the cultivation of children's good habits and behaviors into rich and colorful activities. This is a big challenge for most current early childhood teachers who have not received professional education and training, and they will not be competent.

In addition, most kindergartens have poor infrastructure, making it difficult to meet the needs of various children's activities. Instead of letting teachers laboriously create games and activities, it is easier and more convenient to hang up a blackboard, take a piece of chalk, and teach children to read a few pinyin and recognize a few numbers, saving money and trouble. What's more, safety issues need to be considered when conducting activities. If something goes wrong, no one can take responsibility. In short, arranging dozens of children to sit safely and teaching them some pinyin and arithmetic is safe and trouble-free, and it also wins the satisfaction of parents. It achieves multiple things with one stone, so why not do it?

To change the situation of preschool education becoming primary school, we must carry out comprehensive management from concept to action. The author believes that we should start from the following three aspects.

(1) Establish a correct view of children

Concepts are the forerunners of actions. What kind of ideas will lead to what kind of behavior. The view of children is the sum of adults’ attitudes and opinions towards children, including children’s status and rights, children’s characteristics and abilities, the meaning of childhood, the relationship between education and children’s development, etc. Only under the guidance of a correct view of children can we have a correct view of children's education, and then produce correct children's education behaviors. It can be said that the primary schoolization of preschool education is the result of parents’ blind obedience under the guidance of misconceptions. Relevant government departments, preschool education institutions (such as kindergartens, especially high-quality public kindergartens), relevant departments of universities, communities, networks, media, etc. should assume their due social responsibilities and widely publicize the correct view of children to the whole society and parents. Popularize scientific parenting knowledge, help parents establish a scientific view of children and education, and let parents understand that "children are growing and complete people" and are not containers waiting to be filled with knowledge; childhood is not just preparation for adulthood, it is It has the meaning and value of independent existence; children should have a rich and colorful spiritual life and cultural activities, adults should participate in children's spiritual life and cultural activities, and adults' ideas and concepts cannot be unconditionally imposed on children; the purpose of children's education Not only in children's development, but also in children's joy and happiness.