Parental Wisdom from Abroad

I love this!

From Jennifer Wang-Filomeo:

“This article is about our younger learners and how we teach them as compared to the rest of the world. We seem to be doing things that, at times, are not in the best interest of our kids. The main idea to take away from it is that we overprotect our children when they don't need overprotecting and we don't offer them enough comfort when they do need it.

Children, like adults, must learn from experience. If we protect them from doing basic things, such as using a knife as a tool, because of our fear they will injure themselves, they may never learn how to use it properly – even though they have the skill to do so (with A TOUCH of guidance and help from adults).

Some people think that we will spoil a baby when it is not true. Think of babies as aliens who are visiting Earth and need a lot of help and guidance to learn how us Earthlings work. We Earthlings need to show these space visitors that we are kind, supportive, and caring people so they will feel comfortable with us and be better able to assimilate into our world.”

– Jennifer is a former student and current early childhood educator

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christine-grossloh/have-american-parents-got-it-all-backwards_b_3202328.html