Age For Nursery Class Admissions

7 April 2007

There is an ongoing debate about the age of admissions and curriculum in nursery classes.

Whatever the curriculum, there are some basic principals which must be followed by the educators. It is most important that the process of education does not suck away the joy of life which is most fundamental.

Education is not the purpose of preparing for some future life, it is life itself. A child has the right to be looked after, loved and socialized. Age of three or four is not the time to be tied up with routines, learning to hold pencil and coarse expressions like ‘What is the colour of your hair?’ or ‘where do we go when we are sick?’

Many children lose interest in studies as they grow up because they don’t enjoy the experience. Things like holding a pencil for long might distort delicate finger bones for ever.

A child learns language faster at home up to the age of two compared to the class later in first case there is a self inspired sense of urgency. Children learn very difficult words at their own even before they start going to school, such as remote, mobile, ice-cream, gear, AC etc.

A child at the age of two and a half takes whole year to learn alphabets whereas one year later ( at 3 and 1/2 )the same child is through in fifteen days.

Starting schooling too early is like forcing the bud to open. I also welcome the NCERT’s latest initiative to devise flexible time table in the schools.