Why Preschool is a Must for Your Kids
The old saying, “Home is the first school for a child” is an undeniable truth, but it depends upon how ideal is your home in this regard. An ideal home must have such an environment that inculcates the sense, interest and spirit of learning in kids. If the home is devoid of such ambience, it will rather be detrimental to growth of your kid’s education. Generally, there are three types of homes or home environments in India.
The first type of home is where the parents and elders are educated and they have sufficient time to spend with their children sharing their feelings and experiences, and teaching them the lessons of the books as well as all those things beyond the books. In such home, the above quoted proverb is perfectly brought into effect and this type of home can be called an ideal home for basic learning of your kids.
The second type of home is that where the parents and elders are educated but most or all of them are so busy with their occupations that they are unable to devote their time to their kids. It mostly happens in those of nuclear family homes where both father and mother are preoccupied with business or professional commitments. In such ambience, it becomes difficult for tender minds to develop educationally as learning becomes very arduous for children.
The third type of home is that where neither of the parents—father and mother are educated, nor are other family members literate. Illiterate parents can be found in poor families and even rich families also. Such parents cannot teach their kids or give them any lesson at home. They depend upon others to get their children learn from others. If such illiterate parents hire tutor for their children, he/she also doesn’t pay adequate attention to the students because he/she knows it well that due to being illiterate, the students’ parents can neither criticise, nor can they pressurise him/her to teach well.
How preschools came into existence
Actually, the concept of preschool came into effect to serve the educational purpose of above mentioned second and third types of homes/families. In India, the awakening of preschool came late, while in developed countries it started much earlier. In India, first the concept of preschool came with Christian missionaries. That’s the reason why convent or semi-convent schools mostly start from nursery classes, i.e. preschool or play school. However, since education has been commercialised in India, a large number of preschools have mushroomed in urban India. People are running private preschools where the enormity of fee structure is guaranteed for possibility of quality learning for your kids. Of course, many of them provide very good quality education and other facilities where you’ll feel that your hard-earned amount of fee is utilized well as in return your kids are getting quality education. In fact, preschool or nursery school has been started to impart basic learning to small kids in such a systematic way that is not possible at your home.
Aanganwadi schools
Aanganwadi schools are a good initiative of Government of India and it can be assumed as counterpart of preschool. These are the government play schools which are more popular and preferred in rural India, though these schools are also running in urban region. In Aanganwadi schools, the teachers and other staff are appointed to impart education and provide other facilities to the children of below average income and below poverty line parents. Besides education, meals are also served to the students, but Aanganwadi schools have not done as well as private and public schools. However, it’s a kind of gift for financially challenged parents from the Government of India.
What make preschools beneficially different from homes?
A good preschool (mostly the private ones) can provide your kids such educational and other facilities that you cannot provide them at homes.
Qualified and well trained teachers are appointed there to teach your wards and even teach them many other things that are aside from their textbooks. They are well trained in teaching and making the students a good citizen.
A preschool has at least a small playground (if not the large one), various toys, learning tools, sports items and other objects of play so that your kids can play and stay healthy. They are also given physical training according to their age to make them healthy and good sportsperson. They are also taught social etiquette and precautionary measures and solutions in regard of health and hygiene and even what to do at any accidental event.
Plays, skits, debate, music and song, painting and other cultural activities and competitions that keep your children ambitious, diligent and active to participate in such activities and learn more about them.
At school, your children have company of other classmates that give them the chances of interacting with each other and exchanging knowledge/information that widen the ambit of thought amongst them. More often, competitive environment makes a child to work hard to do much better than others. In this pursuit, the child starts performing well in any sphere of life.
If the school of your ward is facilitated with smart classes, STEM/STEAM education and Tinkering lab, it will be great addition to the advantages of sending your ward to such preschool.
So, these are the distinct advantages of sending your tiny tots to preschool that you cannot provide at your homes. Of course, management of many schools zeroes in on your pockets as they have commercialised education beyond its limit and that’s the reason why complaints of the parents often remain in the news. However, this is also a fact that the schools cannot provide latest facilities and quality education until they accrue adequate revenues in the form of fee.