With the arrival of September the routines return and everything seems to be put back in its place. The older ones return to work, the children to school and the youngest to the nursery school.
Or no, wait, some don't go. Some families decide not to take their children to nursery school, although it seems logical and advisable for their proper development is to go.
To what extent is this true? People say that they get more up there, that they will meet other children there and know that they are not the center of the universe, with what they will learn before to live in society and to rub shoulders with their peers. Let's talk a little about it. What happens if we don't take you to nursery school?
And the nurseries were renamed nursery schools
Nurseries they were created to give attention and care to those children who could not be cared for by their families, especially as a result of the incorporation of women into work.
As time has passed, nurseries have become increasingly specialized, offering children more educational resources and more professional attention. Thus, what was once a solution to a problem has become a resource for many families, who even having the possibility of staying with children at home have decided to take them equally.
Such is the change that until recently known nurseries They have been trying for years to know everyone as nursery schools.
What is a child's psycho-evolutionary development?
In order to know how necessary nursery schools can be for children up to 3 years old, it is necessary to know what children are like up to that moment. We'll see what is the psychoevolutive development of a child and so we will know the best time for her to start being more separated from her mother and more accompanied by other children and adults.
The baby, from birth to 7-8 months of life does not have a clear reference of its existence. Let's say you feel like part of the mother, as if it were an extension of her and not a unique person. From that moment, between 6 and 10 months, they begin to realize that they exist as individual beings and begin to experience as unique people. It is said that it is the moment in which the "I" appears, although it is a very rudimentary "I".
It is the typical stage of separation anguish, when children, realizing that they exist beyond the mother, feel distress and discomfort if separated from her. Let's say you suddenly realize that you can be without each other and that makes you very uncomfortable (logical, because your survival depends entirely on the care of your primary caregiver).
Many people see it as something negative and even so it makes the mother know: "Of course, as you always are with him now he does not love others." The reality is that, even if it seems a lie, separation distress is a positive manifestation that shows that the child has created an emotional bond with his parents and that he is able to differentiate between familiar people and strangers.
Little by little, as the image of the known people (the parents) is internalized a little more, and he knows a little more about those he considers strangers (grandmothers, for example), the child may spend more time without his parents (reminding them internally if necessary to calm down a bit) and more time with other people.
We don't talk about a few weeks, not even a few months. It is a process that usually culminates towards 2 or 3 years, when children tolerate maternal absence more, when they can remember their mother mentally if they need to calm down and when they begin to understand that, even if their mother is not with him at any given time, she will return (I repeat, "they begin to understand", that they do not "understand").
The child is the center of the universe until 6 years old
Children usually live self-centered for at least 6 years. It is something normal and logical, because to know your place and your position within a society, the first and indispensable thing is to know yourself (if not, it is like going to a fruit box to choose the one that seems to be better, without knowing what the fruit that we should choose should look like).
For younger children (up to approximately 3 years old) the most important thing is their relationship with the person who has spent more time with him (usually the mother) and everything that has to do with themselves. Let's say that what happens outside of that relationship, even what other children do, has little interest for them.
It is common to hear that up to 3 years children do not play with other children, but next to other children. This is true. They can interact in some way, it is logical because they are in the same space, but the most common is that the game is individual.
Many people take children to kindergarten to learn to share, not to be so individualistic or selfish. The reality is that they will not learn too much the act of lending something (rather they will learn to resign themselves to the loss of a desired object), nor do they have to learn to live with other children (again, they will rather learn to resign themselves).
From 3 years they understand more and begin to understand the coexistence
After 3 years, the child remains very self-centered, although he begins to understand more things than those around him, he expresses himself better and is better able to understand that there are other children who share caregiver care (brothers, classmates).
In short, one could say that it is after 3 years of age that true socialization begins to occur. It is from that moment when a child begins to understand, little by little, what is his place in the world. The more you know yourself, the more you also know others and the more capable you are to live surrounded by other children.
Concluding
Seeing that true socialization begins to occur after 3 years, as the child knows himself better, he expresses himself better and has a higher level of understanding (I speak of "from 3 years old", not "at 3 years old"), the conclusion drawn is that children do not need to go to a nursery school. In fact, knowing that until 3 years the most important thing for them is the relationship with their referent figures, their mother and their father, the ideal is that this relationship be solid, of love, of much love, of trust and in which Share a lot of time.
Anyway, if a family wants to take it, or if it really has no alternative, it is known that nursery schools with low rates and ** loving and respectful educators ** can achieve almost the same result as if the child stays at home with its closest referents, being It is best to take them before 6-8 months, when a child does not suffer the so-called separation anguish, or after 18-24 months, when a child is older. Thus, the separation, or the adaptation process, can be carried out, with time, spending few hours in the nursery school, in the company of the mother and / or the father, and increase, even with them, until the child sees school as a family place and feel the people who will be with him as part of his life.
It is not necessary that children be their best and inseparable friends (who by age will not be), nor that they feel that the caretaker of the school is their second mother, but that they have a minimum trust relationship, and this, of course , is not achieved in 3 days of adaptation period.
Photos | Mrs. W ,, A.M.Garrido on Flickr
In Babies and more | When should socialization begin in children ?, At daycare or at home ?, Risks and benefits of going to daycare (I), (II) and (III), Should we go to daycare to prepare for the school?
