Continuouseducation is an integral part of a teacher’s life-long growth. To guide ourwork here at the Guanhua Enlightenment Garden, we invited Professor Zhou toobserve and evaluate our teaching and environment. The humanistic qualities and professionalabilities demonstrated by the Guanhua Education team were highly praised by theProfessor. She offered us some important feedback after seeing our activities:
Inregards to our nursery team: From the moment she entered thegarden, Professor Zhou could feel that every staff member loved children. During the teacher’s training, the professor said one of themost important facets of teaching the 0-3 age group is for adults to providepositive companionship, which could be seen in the children’s feedback and bodylanguage as we went about our lesson. Professor Zhou gave an example:While riding the metro, she once observed a child crying but the parents didn’tseem to pay attention to their child, staring down at their phone instead.After five minutes, the parent still ignored the child and hadn’t given anyfeedback. Plainly speaking, this is an unacceptable and ignorant approach toparenting, and the subsequent consequences are extensive. During this stage of their lives, adults can respond to achild’s development according to their particular personalities.
ProfessorZhou observed also observedthat the teachers in the Enlightenment Gardenrespected the children very much. As the children made pomelo tea, the childrenwere interested in the peel. The children explored the textures and smells andall the while, the teacher simply observed without disturbing him. In the end,one child took the peel and made a phone call. No amount of teaching inputcompares to the independent learning of children at this age. Professor Zhoualso gave a case in which babies with Inthe activity of making honey grapefruit tea, a child was very interested ingrapefruit peel. He picked up the grapefruit peel and smelled it, and theteacher saw it. Without disturbing him, the child enjoyed such a process ofexploration very much. In the end, the child took the grapefruit peel and madea phone call. Sure enough, no amount of teaching input was enough for thechildren to learn and learn independently. growing up. Professor Zhou alsoshowed a case of two different babies with differing personalities. Whenpresented with a new an interesting plant, both children were told by theirmothers not to touch it. One baby couldn’t restrain himself from crawling overto it, while the other was quick to ignore it after her mother’s instructions.Every child is different at every stage of growth. It is our responsibility asteachers and parents to observe and understand the child’s the languageabilities, physical development, temperament and personality teach inaccordance with their aptitude.
Professor Zhou also stressed theimportance for home education, giving the teachers of the Enlightenment Gardenthe responsibility to aid parents in family education. She pointed out that inJapan’s childcare institutions, parents and institutions are inseparable.Parents must have the awareness to actively participate in their children’slife and learning, learn more about their children’s daily life, and activelyrespond with feedback and cooperation. A study has shown that a child’svocabulary can reach 1,200 words in an environment of frequent communication withfamily members from the age of 0-3. In an average communication environment,children can only master 600 words. The least optimistic is that in a homesetting, many conversations are only in the range of 300 words. This shows theimportance of family education.