I've had the same conversation with many people who have children between the ages of 3 and 6, for the past few years. We talk about the child going into preschool or kindergarten, and then the parent points out how much work is involved for small children now. When we were kids, preschool and kindergarten were about playing, singing songs, doing art projects, going on field trips in the community, doing Show and Tell, etc. Now, 4 and 5 year olds sit at tables and do worksheets. Many kindergarteners, and some preschoolers, even attend full-day programs, and are allowed no naps or down time.
One thing that has changed is the way that small children are taught. When I was in preschool or kindergarten, our teacher did work with us on the alphabet and numbers, but a lot of learning was done just by playing, trying new things, and discovering. Now, direct instruction is often used instead of discovery. Direct instruction is when the teacher teaches specific information to the children. For example, if a teacher takes out a set of blocks and says, "This is how you make a tower," shows the children, and then asks them to make their own towers, that is direct instruction. If the teacher brings out the set of blocks and asks, "What can we do with these blocks?" it allows for discovery.
I recently read an article about an experiment that was done with preschoolers. Two groups of children were given the same toy, which did different things when you pushed various buttons, pulled strings, etc. In the first group, an adult leader told the children, "Here is how the toy works," and showed them how to push one of the many buttons to make a noise.
In the second group, the leader brought out the toy, and made it squeak, pretending she had done it by accident. She said something like, "Oh, wow, when I pushed that button, it squeaked!"
Both groups of children were then left to play with the toy on their own. In the first group, where the children had been specifically taught how to push one of the buttons, they usually just pushed that button over and over again to play with the toy. They did not show curiosity about the toy, but assumed the leader had told then everything they needed to know. In the second group, where the children had watched the leader "discover" something but had not been given direct instructions, the children explored the toy and figured out everything it did. The second group also played with the toy for a longer amount of time.
In a day and age when even preschoolers are tested and expected to know very specific things by the time they enter kindergarten, direct instruction has its benefits. It is the quickest and most efficient way to get the children to know exactly what you want them to know, without wasting time learning things that will not be needed for future testing.
Imagine this scenario. You have just started a new job in an office building, and you need to make copies of something. The most efficient thing might be to ask someone where the copy machine is, and how to use the machine. But what if you had to figure it out on your own? You might walk around the building, searching for the copy machine. In the process, you might find out where the break room is, find an exit that leads right out to where your car is parked, and notice that there is a second washroom you can use if the first one is occupied. When you do find the copy machine, as you try to figure it out, you might accidentally discover how to make double-sided copies, or how to make collated versus uncollated packets. All this may take you a little longer than if someone had us shown you what to do. But when left to figure it out on your own, you learned so much more!
I don't think that direct instruction should never, ever be used in early childhood. Children may learn to sort and categorize by playing with shape tiles, but they will probably need someone to demonstrate counting for them and teach them the names of the numbers. And who thinks they'd be able to figure out how to tie their shoe, without anyone showing you? But I think they should definitely be given lots of time to explore, experiment, and discover things on their own.
One thing that has changed is the way that small children are taught. When I was in preschool or kindergarten, our teacher did work with us on the alphabet and numbers, but a lot of learning was done just by playing, trying new things, and discovering. Now, direct instruction is often used instead of discovery. Direct instruction is when the teacher teaches specific information to the children. For example, if a teacher takes out a set of blocks and says, "This is how you make a tower," shows the children, and then asks them to make their own towers, that is direct instruction. If the teacher brings out the set of blocks and asks, "What can we do with these blocks?" it allows for discovery.
I recently read an article about an experiment that was done with preschoolers. Two groups of children were given the same toy, which did different things when you pushed various buttons, pulled strings, etc. In the first group, an adult leader told the children, "Here is how the toy works," and showed them how to push one of the many buttons to make a noise.
In the second group, the leader brought out the toy, and made it squeak, pretending she had done it by accident. She said something like, "Oh, wow, when I pushed that button, it squeaked!"
Both groups of children were then left to play with the toy on their own. In the first group, where the children had been specifically taught how to push one of the buttons, they usually just pushed that button over and over again to play with the toy. They did not show curiosity about the toy, but assumed the leader had told then everything they needed to know. In the second group, where the children had watched the leader "discover" something but had not been given direct instructions, the children explored the toy and figured out everything it did. The second group also played with the toy for a longer amount of time.
In a day and age when even preschoolers are tested and expected to know very specific things by the time they enter kindergarten, direct instruction has its benefits. It is the quickest and most efficient way to get the children to know exactly what you want them to know, without wasting time learning things that will not be needed for future testing.
Imagine this scenario. You have just started a new job in an office building, and you need to make copies of something. The most efficient thing might be to ask someone where the copy machine is, and how to use the machine. But what if you had to figure it out on your own? You might walk around the building, searching for the copy machine. In the process, you might find out where the break room is, find an exit that leads right out to where your car is parked, and notice that there is a second washroom you can use if the first one is occupied. When you do find the copy machine, as you try to figure it out, you might accidentally discover how to make double-sided copies, or how to make collated versus uncollated packets. All this may take you a little longer than if someone had us shown you what to do. But when left to figure it out on your own, you learned so much more!
I don't think that direct instruction should never, ever be used in early childhood. Children may learn to sort and categorize by playing with shape tiles, but they will probably need someone to demonstrate counting for them and teach them the names of the numbers. And who thinks they'd be able to figure out how to tie their shoe, without anyone showing you? But I think they should definitely be given lots of time to explore, experiment, and discover things on their own.