In mid May a study was released from the Yale Child Study Center finding that "preschool children are three times as likely to be expelled as children in primary school" making that approximately 5,000 preschool children a year.
When we say "preschool children" do we get the picture? Very young children ages 3-5 years or sometimes two and a half through 5. If we think physical size these are little people - much smaller than the average adult who cares for them.
For example I have observed adults in a room become paralyzed with inaction when a little toddler (age 2 or so) says "no" defiantly to their parents when it is time to go home from the Child Care Center. Sometimes I come quietly from behind and tap the adult gently on his or her arm. I say softly, "Pick her up." What were they all afraid of?
Our role as adults is to guide and support children as they learn the ways of our society - not expel them when they do not follow orders. Early development means that young children are naturally egocentric until they learn how to adjust to our social norms. If we throw them out - away - how do we help them join us? How do we model a caring community if we exclude them at such a tender age?
Bruce Perry says that early childhood is the easiest time to create humane people, and traumatized children are from a different culture. He also says in the first three years of life we lay down memory for the rest of your life, and in our society we make the choices about our socio-culture - it is not genetic - some of our choices, Perry says, are excellent and some are bad.
When young children bite, kick, push, spit, curse, throw stuff around or at people, hit or yell, chances are they are in trouble. They are probably in deep, emotional pain or their anxiety level is too high and they have no other means at their disposal to let us know how they feel.
It is in those very moments we should hold still, enfold the child with loving arms and give her a firm, clear, direct message: I am here to help you, I will never abandon you, you are so important to me, I want everyone to be safe here, I am in this with you, we'll get through this together, you are not a bad person.
Not chuck 'em out!
Walter Gilliam, from the Yale Child Study Center and author of the recent research on preschool expulsion said: "Expulsion is the most severe disciplinary response that any educational system can impose on a student ... and represents the complete cessation of educational services without the benefit of alternative services."
Now tell me: how do you create humane people from that?
I know that this is a complex issue. For example, teachers of young children are underpaid or qualified, group sizes are way too large, and inappropriate teaching methods are used because of standardized testing. However, I have a lot of suggestions about what we could choose to do as a society that does not include exclusion. If you are really interested, I will tell you about them one day.
[spoken in a whisper] Oh yes and I forgot to mention, I also have a theory about why we fear children's behaviors that challenge us. But that is for a different post.
Tamar, your writing on this subject just rends my heart, as someone who was taught by the age of 3 that I was beyond the pale. Just as well exclusion didn't happen in those days, I suppose - I'd definitely have been a candidate. By the time I was 5 I used to put myself in the corner because I'd learned that I was very very bad. But no one had tried to hold my rage and help me to deal with it, only told me I was wicked, which frightened me and made me scream louder and become more immovably defiant. And 45 years later it still feels like yesterday. Ugh!
Posted by: Jean | June 16, 2005 at 11:26 AM
Jean, thanks very much for sharing this. It is precisely because of experiences like yours that I am writing about this. In fact, I hope that my next book will deal with this issue head on.
I am so sorry that you had to go through such humiliation and disrespect. Your pain rends my heart.
Posted by: Tamar | June 16, 2005 at 12:46 PM
This is fascinating and important. I don't know the right answer. Please write more about this.
Posted by: Richard Lawrence Cohen | June 17, 2005 at 09:21 AM
So sad the conflict has hit the pre-schools - individualism versus roboticism. Like Richard, I hope you write more about this, Tamar. I want to know your suggestions because I've run into this problem headlong.
I have to hand it to the pre-school we sent our children to in that they successfully manage all kinds of children. The teachers are so good at comforting that even the kids who act out the most are worked into states of calm without trauma. The program there is created for the child - they bend the rules if the child needs the rules bent. My second son didn't fit the mold and the teachers completely "understood." They adjusted the lessons and let him play with the groups in which he felt most comfortable, even if the group was of a slightly younger age level. If he wasn't in tune with what they were doing, he was allowed to do something else. Same with my daughter who attends now. Their particularities are enjoyed rather than punished.
I've yet to come across that same level of compassion in the public schools even when such compassion is possible. Public schools can be handed a method of compassion that will work with the state standards and they will refuse because they don't want to bend the rules. As I mentioned in my most recent blog post, my oldest son doesn't fit the mold in junior high and he's punished rather than getting his needs met. I understand that the schools need to stick to state standards, money is at stake, I get the requirement of it. However, they do not bend at all unless the child has a diagnosed disability. They do not serve the child. Very frustrating. Because the child grows up and then can only get ahead by bending society's rules and "thinking out of the box." Our schools train them to be robots then they get punished by society for being robots.
Posted by: adriana bliss | June 17, 2005 at 12:39 PM
Richard and Adriana, I will be writing more on this. It is a subject that is very dear to my heart and, hopefully, Danny's.
Adriana, I am so sad to hear about the state of public schools with regards to emotional development. When I address this issue it is usually at the early childhood level so let's see what future posts will bring. What good fortune you have with your children's preschool!
Posted by: Tamar | June 17, 2005 at 03:37 PM