Every child is born with curiosity
Nature has built us with a basic instinct called ‘curiosity’. Curiosity to see, touch, smell, taste, feel and that is the basis of learning anything. Humans are hardwired to do all these things in a way to experience and understand this world. We need to be curious about things that we want to know, and curiosity comes naturally to children.
Misconception about learning
It is a big misconception of many people that we can learn only when someone teaches us or instructs us otherwise, we cannot learn. In reality the scenario is exactly opposite, we only learn when we really want to explore/experience it.
Today, everyone focuses on learning without understanding the basic nature of learning. Every parent likes their children to learn things faster from an earlier age and that’s why they start putting their child into different activity centers and institutes from early ages.
Some parents are not even aware about whether their child is really interested in learning it or not. Parents are totally unaware that their child is an independent learner and does not require any specific methodology to learn something.
Understand basic nature of Learning
Try to understand this way, how can you teach a child a drawing/painting? Drawing can not be taught and it is not a question of learning. Drawing/Painting is an art and art can not be taught, it can only be experienced, isn’t it so? Try to name any painter who goes to school to learn painting and then become a painter. And this applies to all of us.
Try to remember our earlier years when we hated mathematics but our parents still forced us to attend the classes for it. And it becomes even worse when we score less marks and now parents push us for extra classes for it. Wasn’t it worse? We got less marks because we are not at all interested in it or we hated the way it was taught by our teacher or maybe for any other reason. The question here is whether we really want to learn it or not? Basically, by forcing we have already crushed the interest of learning also. Learning can not happen in this way.
Let children be an inquirer
Learning can only happen when you allow your child to be curious about it. Provide an environment for children where they can stay with their curiosity, which gives them opportunities for going into the process of inquiring. Let them ask questions, let them inquire about the smallest details and let them be their own explorer.
All children learn differently in their time and space. So don’t judge or stop their process of learning. And also do not give any answer to their question if you really do not know the subject matter. Let children answer their question and at the end you will see the joy of learning on their face.
Learning is a process and not the end result
Whenever you find that your child is asking something, consider that they are already in the process of learning. Learning is a process, not an outcome. Now, it is your responsibility to know how you respond to your child. If you respond with the same enthusiasm and interest then it will be a beautiful journey of learning. Otherwise, they will lose interest and drop the inquiry.
Math can only be learnt when you have curiosity for numbers, logic, patterns, geometrical shapes etc. As a parent, your role will be very important to what subject your child is inquiring more about.
Outside instructions only matter when you are ready from inside. So, I always encourage parents to put emphasis on experiences rather than learning. Learning will automatically happen when your child is having a journey of beautiful experiences to know something.
