I never dreamed before that I will be an early-childhood teacher like I am now. The teacher who teach children at age 3-7. Some might think that my occupation right now is need no skill at all. You just play with children, just like baby-sitter do. Well, I have some experience, met some people who weirdly stare at me right after I told them that I am a kindergarten teacher. At that time, I concluded that “you’ll be more appreciated if you are a high-school teacher or maybe a lecturer in a university, because it is more difficult“. Is that true? Is being an early-age teacher too easy? Hold on.
In fact, I do only play with children everyday. Sounds fun and easy, right?
Children world is about playing and playing. Playing is a serious activity for them. They learn much while playing.
I read some psychology book about early-ages before I start my day as a kindergarten teacher. I was not surprised when the book wrote that the early-ages is a golden-ages phase, I heard about that before. It is being told that at the golden-ages, human absorb information at it fastest speed. A person will learn a lot at that age. It is a fundamental moment. I don’t know if it’s really true or not. I have no younger brother/sister in my family. So, I took that as a theory for my based teaching method.
After weeks of teaching, I believe that it is true. My students can remember a lot of English and Indonesian songs easily, while some other teachers (the adult) still need to remind the rhythm. Whoaa.. their brain are like a HSUPA modem! They learn how to dance, sings, enrich vocabularies, and tempo without realize it. They thought they are just playing. It was just fun activities for them.It makes me think that I need to ‘doctrine’ them good stuff. Good understanding, good words, good songs, and so on. I need to filter my words too because they will absorb anything they’ve heard or seen; good or bad. They haven’t reach the understanding about which is right or not, it’s our responsibility as an adult to let them know.
Last month, I was sitting in a Construction Area, watch some of my students play with blocks and lego-like. They made some building as usual. A girl student called me, “Miss, look at the building I’ve made! It’s an Eiffel tower”. I responded, “Wow, great! I will take a picture of it”. I took my phone, set the camera and capture my student’s building. When I checked the picture, I realized what I missed at first. She arranged the blocks with a very good logic. She found the correct slope for the tower’s feet so that the tower can stand vertically. She learned it naturally without being told. It’s another good input for her brain. See, play is also learning.
Yes, I really do agree that an early-age learns very fast is true.
I hope an adult can utilize the moment for good purposes. We can give children a proper environment to stimulate them exploring how this world works. It will be good for their future. Unfortunately, some adults still don’t realize this. They do whatever they want–even it’s not a good habit– in front of children as if the children don’t record, or worse, follow the habit. For example, watching TV too much, play video games, curse, listen to an adult love songs, shout at maid….they think that “Aah..he/she is a little kid, won’t understand it”. Big fail.
So, be careful. Teaching an early-age children is not as easy as you might think.
*Maaf kalau geje yeee :D
