Time to go back to the drawing board on early childhood education
What type of society is this? What have our priorities been for the past 30 years, especially in the education sector? Where have we been?
Social scientists and educational psychologists opine that the human brain is the last organ to develop to its fullest potential.
Research indicates that it takes 20 years for the brain to get to the point where it is fully developed, meaning that the work that is done to develop the child from adolescence to early adulthood is of vital importance to engender a culture of meaning, purpose and ultimately a drive to succeed.
If you miss it then, forget about the potential you will derive from the adult who has been neglected from the early years. Is it surprising that we have the challenges that we face in SA? Rising crime rates, homelessness, unemployment and general helplessness have come to define the experiences of many in our society.
The question we ought to ask is what is being done to instill the right focus on early education to ensure we have better results in the future.
This is not only about demonstrating how we benchmark ourselves against other nations on literacy and education. It's also about fulfilling an agenda set by the June 16 generation to create a country and a people that will hold their heads high and take their rightful place among the community of nations.
A key challenge that most researchers point to is the absence of cognitive attention among our children at the age they are when they take these tests. This refers to the slow cognitive development experienced by a majority of our children in that age group.
Studies such as the University of Pretoria's point to a lack of teaching skills among educators who teach at those levels, the absence of parental involvement in the education of their children and other socioeconomic challenges as the major causes of these challenges.
My own assessment is that we generally don't have a vision as a country when it comes to defining the society that we want. SA's budget for basic education far exceeds that of many developing nations that face similar challenges. The results, however, are far short of those achieved in some of those countries.
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