Just a note on upbringing

" Dreaming of a different season" by Susie Mallett

Sometimes I find things in my note book that I have just jotted down on my travels. They are thoughts that I do not want to lose. Sometimes I have no idea where they appear from or where they are going. Many remain in my note book. That seems to me a shame.

So here is one of them.

Thinking about Kindergartens

“ Parents of non-disabled children send their children to a Kindergarten that is more often than not decided upon for its convenience. Chosen because of its nearness to home, to grand-parents or to work, or because a sibling is already there. It is not necessarily chosen because the upbringing that the children will receive there reflects in any way their own values and ideas on upbringing.

The time the children spend in Kindergarten can be up to eight or even nine hours each day. Despite this the parents believe that they have enough hours left in the day, and at weekends, to influence their children’s lives and to help them to grow up with the values important to the family.

In most cases this is true.

With the disabled children who are attending conductive groups it is a completely different kettle of fish.

Parents choose conductive upbringing as the method thatthey want to use to bring up their children.

Or do they?

They do choose for their children a conductive Kindergarten and the children are in a conductive environment for eight hours a day.

So far so good.

What happens when the children go home? Are these children still in a conductive environment? Are the parents of these children also convinced that they have enough time with the children in the afternoons and at weekends so the values important to the family are learnt?

We hope so. The conductive environment at Kindergarten and the conductive upbringing that the parents have chosen must run hand in hand.

There must be enough communication and teaching and learning going on so that this transition from what goes on in one place, the Kindergarten, to the other, the home, can take place.”

I have no idea what sparked this piece of writing.

Thinking about conductive upbringings

Perhaps I wrote it because I have been thinking recently about the children who boarded at the Petö Institute when I was studying there. I was thinking about how some of them went home on some weekends, others less often. Apart from on the odd weekends, their Kindergarten lives and “home” (PAI) lives, were both conductive, led by conductors.

I wondered how many of the people who went to the Petö Institue to observe groups, actually realised this. , those people who went home and wanted this method for their own families and for others in their home town or country.

I was wondering how many of the visitors really understood that they were actually witnessing of the way that the children “lived”. Did they understand that they themselves were guests in the homes of these children and were being privileged with a glimpse into their lives, living it just as they did every minute of every day. Conductively.

I think that I was pondering a lot about the best methods of delivering a conductive upbringing. My conclusion at that moment was that a combination of an integrative Kindergarten and a lot of input at home could be the best answer. As with everything conductive things change and I expect that next week I will come upon a different note in my notebook, looking for somewhere to be expressed.