Wazuans,

Please advise.

I was thinking of taking my baby girl who is turning 3 in April 2013 to baby class in January.
However, on consultation with her grandmother(on her dad's side) who is very experienced with children, she advised me to put it off for a while as she is still too young, reasons being:

1. She will come to dislike school earlier on which will have a negative effect on her performance in later years.

2. Her mind is not mature enough to hold onto information i.e. one day she may be able to recite the alphabet and the following day, she will be unable to do so therefore leading to frustration.

What is your take on this? Anyone willing to offer their advise.

Points to note:
1.she is quite tall(big) for her age.
2. I think it would be good for her to start interacting with other kids as the neighbourhood in which we live at the moment has very few kids therefore she talks to birds, insects etc.

Don't have much clue on this. Shall cross that bridge around November 2013 like you are doing now. On the second point raised by your grandmother, my opinion is that at that age learning is not really the focus of the school so there would be no pressure for your girl to hold onto information.

My baby girl & yours are of the same age.i have also struggled with the same question for a long time.But it all depends on the circustances.If she is in a good environment with no Househelp headache then let her stay at home.But if not she is betteroff in an instituition than be introduced to wickedness/nonestop TV screen at a tender age.

But if you decide to take her to school,make sure its a good one where teachers knows what they are doing instead of trying to please you through child's performance ending up giving her more than she can chew coz she will definately hate school.At that age they need to learn at their own spead.Thats my opinion and wish you the best

I think 4 - 5 yrs is the right time to introduce formal learning. Before that, learning should be experiential- through play. Unfortunately, many of our so called kindergatens are just formal schools and this sucks. Also, Kenya has no system that supports play groups where kids 5yrs and below meet with other kids in the estate and just play under supervision while their mums or carers catch up on vybe. We grabbed all the plots that would have become estate parks and now we are suffering for it.

I have always wondered what kids go to school to do at 2.5 years or even 3. And as someone has pointed out,kids should play....that is the main occupation of children. I see kids just being introduced to formal learning at such an early age,and then they have to be on top of the class because they are given exams,then after that,they start cramming and going for tuition on holidays and the cycle continues.@ mapozi,why do you want your kid to recite anything now :(



Or am I missing a point here?