Life with a preschooler: Play with Shoes

Monday, June 30, 2008

Play with Shoes

This is Hunter playing with his shoes. He got out every pair of shoe he has and lined them up neatly in a row that reached about five feet.

I had no idea was he was doing and then he got some of his toy animals and started putting them in the shoes. He asked me for help to get his stuffed puppy in one of them and I asked why he was in the shoe, and he said "He's in his car."

"Oh, well of course" I smiled.

I'll have to admit that the first thing that came to mind when I saw what he was doing was, "Austism?" but of course I have to laugh at myself because if you knew Hunter, you would know that he is no where NEAR the Autistic Spectrum and is very bright, social, talkative, inquisitive and physically and intellectually advanced. But I knew that lining things up and being obsessed with order is one thing that characterizes many autistic children and that's why the thought came to mind, but he does neither of those things except for this one play episode. Lining the shoes up was probably a copy of how he sees cars lined up on roads and in parking lots, and I'm sure that's what triggered this little imagination gig.

I thought I'd share this fun little moment with you. I like to post blogs on here frequently of Hunter being himself, letting everyone know that his life is not sitting in front of flash cards all day and that he has a VERY active imagination and enjoys playing all day every day, whether that play is washing dishes with Mommy, looking at cards about insect species, splashing in the kiddie pool or creating an exciting world with shoes, Legos and animal figures.

"And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof."
Zechariah 8:5

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"We have succeeded in keeping our children carefully isolated from learning in a period of life when the desire to learn is at its peak. The human brain is unique in that it is the only container of which it can be said that the more you put into it, the more it will hold. Between nine months and four years the ability to absorb information is unparalleled, and the desire to do so is higher than it will ever be again. Yet during this period we keep the child clean, well fed, safe from the world about him - and in a learning vacuum."

-Glenn Doman

There is no child too young to learn. And the most curious learner in the world is the small child below six years of age. Babies and little children are natural learners and problems- solvers and they WANT to learn about everything there is to know, and they want to do so right now.

Yet what most people have not realized is that little children can appreciate Michelangelo just as easily as cheap and simplistic cartoons. A little baby will learn phalanges, clavicle, and humerus just as easily (and just as joyfully) as he learns fingers, shoulder, and arm. Beethoven goes into their ears just as easily as Pop Goes the Weasel. And he will memorize great scriptures, songs, and sonnets just as easily as he memorizes commercial jingles and nursery rhymes.

Little kids are capable of a lot more than counting to ten and making dirty diapers. You can teach a small child absolutely anything that you present to him in an honest, factual, and joyous way, and if you teach a tiny child the facts, he will discover the rules.

Small kids are experts at discovering the rules that govern a set of facts. Ever hear a small child say "I drinked that"? We laugh at his "poor" speech when in fact he just applied the rule of grammar that says if you add "ed" to the end of a verb it makes it past tense. When was the last time YOU reviewed a language to discover a rule of grammar? May I suggest that you were perhaps three years old?

Little kids will discover the rules that govern any set of facts and you can apply this reality to teach a very small child to read fluently, understand mathematics effortlessly, have perfect pitch, and understand and ENJOY many concepts typically considered far beyond their reach, and you can do so with just seconds of joyful play each day. No pressure, no elaborate or boring lessons, just joyfully showing a child the facts for a few seconds every day, and letting him discover the rules. In our house, learning is a privilege, not a chore.

You can raise a precocious learner with strong character, social grace, and physical excellence if only you will give him the opportunity and environment to thrive in.

Learning many interesting and worthwhile things does not hinder Hunter's imagination, creativity, or desire to learn but fuels it, as you will soon see. The myth of a "lost childhood" applies more correctly to children who are raised by tired, stressed, distracted parents, without a plan or purpose, who try to fit their child into everything else they have going on in their life.

So welcome to our blog, and enjoy the fun, excitement, and inquisitiveness you can have as you discover the potential of life with a preschooler.