{"id":10657,"date":"2017-05-05T21:54:19","date_gmt":"2017-05-05T13:54:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/?p=10657"},"modified":"2021-06-18T12:11:38","modified_gmt":"2021-06-18T04:11:38","slug":"alternative-kindergarten-early-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/2017\/05\/alternative-kindergarten-early-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Other Ways to Learn"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Hong Kong parents seek alternatives of pre-school education for their child<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Reporters: Angela Siu, Brianna To, Jade Li, Kristy Tong<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Editor: Megan Leung<\/strong><br \/>\n<code><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/215975566\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/code><\/p>\n<p>In Hong Kong, academic competition begins early \u2013 as early as kindergarten where children start learning to read and write so that they can be competitive primary school applicants. But despite the increasing pressure for academic success, some parents are pursuing alternative learning approaches for their kids and letting the children choose what they want to learn at an appropriate time.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hkforestadventures.com\">Hong Kong Forest Adventures<\/a> is a playgroup for children aged one and a half to six years-old. Fees range from HK$450-700 per session depending on the programmes they join, including day trips and camps. The sessions are child-led and not curriculum driven. Established in 2015, the playgroup started with just eight children joining their programmes. Today, 26 children attend on a weekly basis, and hundreds more join one-off trips every month. Danie Strydom, the founder of Hong Kong Forest Adventures, thinks learning should not be restricted to tangible knowledge such as writing. Instead, he believes that children learn through play.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen they play they learn, they learn about something that is heavy, and something that is light. They learn about colours because they see the colours all around them. They learn all the time &#8211; play is how children learn. I think if we think that they only learn when they do academic stuff, we don\u2019t know what learning is,\u201d Strydom says, adding that kids learn soft skills such as sharing, negotiating and persistence through play.<\/p>\n<p>Another alternative approach to early education is the Montessori approach. This contrasts with the traditional education system in Hong Kong in that it is child-led, with an emphasis on independence, freedom within limits and self-exploration in a stress-free but stimulating mixed age environment.<\/p>\n<p>Fiona Kwong, is a full-time mum with two kids aged two and four. She runs a blog called <a href=\"http:\/\/www.playfulchaos.com\/\">\u2018Playful Chaos\u2019<\/a> about Montessori education and she hopes her kids can learn naturally develop a love of learning.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.infinitychildren.com\/\">Infinity Children\u2019s School<\/a> is one of the Montessori schools in Hong Kong. The school runs courses for young children below the age of three with their parents, and mixed-age classes for children aged three to six. It is more costly than conventional kindergartens &#8211;\u00a0 monthly fees for half day and whole day mixed-age classes are HK$7,100 and HK$10,850 respectively. However, despite the cost, Infinity Children\u2019s School is oversubscribed.<\/p>\n<p>The daily routine in a Montessori school is different from that of traditional schools. Children in conventional pre-schools and kindergartens cannot choose what they want to learn. But so-called alternative schools try to encourage self-exploration and their curricula tend to be based on a child\u2019s specific stage of development.<\/p>\n<p>Some parents prefer not to send their children to pre-schools or kindergarten altogether. Wincy Chan, a homeschool parent, says kindergartens want children to learn tangible knowledge, such as writing from an early age.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe think that our kids are not ready for such education, so we deferred their admission to let them grow, hoping to let them explore more and play more,\u201d says Chan.<\/p>\n<p>Homeschooling after the age of six is not encouraged in Hong Kong, and most children will eventually enter mainstream schools to continue their education. Chan knows her children will have to adapt when time for the transition comes, but she believes it won\u2019t be that different from the adaptation kindergarteners make have to make when entering primary school.<\/p>\n<p>Whether it\u2019s learning through forest adventures, Montessori schools or homeschooling, Ralph Yau, the founder of <a href=\"http:\/\/gideon.mcnet.com.hk\/hkmrda\/\">Hong Kong Montessori Research and Development Association<\/a> says we shouldn\u2019t dwell on the idea of an \u201calternative\u201d education. Yau believes education shouldn\u2019t be judged on whether it\u2019s \u201calternative\u201d or not \u2013 it should only be differentiated by whether it is suitable for human development.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Many Hong Kong parents believe that giving their kids the best start in life means pushing them to study more and to learn earlier. However, some parents are adopting other learning approaches. Varsity chats with these parents and their children\u2019s teachers to learn about their reasons for pursuing \u2018unconventional\u2019 pre-school education. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10662,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,1784],"tags":[74,47,735,205,733,734],"class_list":["post-10657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-focus","category-multimedia-may-2017","tag-children","tag-education","tag-homeschooling","tag-hong-kong","tag-kindergarten","tag-montessori"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10657"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10657\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10670,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10657\/revisions\/10670"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}