Writing at 5 is no big deal
“I want you to buy me this book.”
“I want you to buy me that book.”
Darling Angel requests for almost every book she sees in the Scholastic catalogs she brings from school. We now make weekly trips to the library, that way her reading list is not limited to what we buy. So I told her, “write down all the books you want to read, and we’ll get them from the library”.
Today I gave her a notebook and she immediately grabbed a pencil and started to write. A (”mommy, how do you spell little?”) LITTLE OLD LADY WHO WAS (”mommy, how do you spell afraid?”) AFRAID OF NOT (mommy, how do you spell nothing?”) THING.
“Wow!”, I thought. She wrote that from memory. She will turn five next month.
Then I remembered, that at age five, I could also write. And I don’t think it was a big deal that I could. I remember because at the time, I lived with my grandmother while my mother was abroad getting her Masters degree. It was right after my 5th birthday and my grandmother told me to write my mom a letter. I wrote a long letter which was essentially a list of all the toys I wanted her to buy - a list inspired by the pictures on my birthday cards. I can remember my grandmother’s disapproving eyes as she lectured me about the proper way to write a letter - inquire about her well being, tell her what I’m doing etc.
My point is, the expectations that kids are held to where I grew up (in Nigeria) is totally different from here in the USA. I appreciate so much about America, and my graduate school experience here was top notch, but I’m disappointed with the school system at the kindergarten stage.
I feel like my daughter is capable of so much more, if only someone would teach her. So when I ask her teacher about efforts to take her to the next stage, and her teacher tells me that my daughter (who is in pre-K) is not expected to know how to Read at her age, I feel very extremely disappointed. I sit down, quietly exploding with conflicting emotions (did we pick the right school?, is the teacher listening to me?, am I doing the right thing as a parent?) as the teacher proudly displays evidence that my daughter can identify colors, her name, the alphabets and numbers 0 to 9. I agree with the teacher that social development is important, but heck, that can be developed simultaneously with reading, writing, math and all other fun things.
The Nigerian education system is not fantastic. In fact, I can argue that it’s terrible. And gets progressively worse as one advances, then maybe improves at the graduate levels. Need a graph? Its failings are due to lack of supplies, teachers that are not paid, inadequate facilities. I could go on, but this is not the right forum. While the system may be worse, high expectations remain, and children succeed. Now, imagine what children could do in a system that lacked these inadequacies!
People are different, kids are different. Maybe not every kid will be able to write at 5. Maybe that kid would be more accomplished in some other area. But if every kids potential is developed to it’s highest potential (of course, while balancing with social development), I’m sure we’ll find a kid who would publish poetry at the age of 5.
