Is a career in early childhood a boon or a bane?

DISCLAIMER: This post is in no way intended to degrade early childhood educators with professional qualifications - many of whom are my friends who possess exceptionally well-meaning intentions toward their students. Further, this is by no means an attack on working mothers (and fathers) who have joined the workforce. I, myself, am a product of parents who have been employed for most of their adult lives.

This post instead confronts realistic problems tied to raising a family in a society that promotes economic gains versus parents personally attending to children's needs. I live in a cosmopolitan country that dictates a living standard where husbands and wives ought to depend on early childhood centres during their child(ren)'s most formative years - something I consider a serious waste after my first four years of parenthood.

Even if the literature is filled with evidence-based studies that over glorify the family as 'society's basic and most important unit' - noting that nothing comes close to family by order of priority in terms of providing a nurturing environment for child development - this cliche is left only as a rhetoric tangential to child-raising practice.

Employment teaches adults to be apologetic if they come 10 minutes late to a corporate meeting, but never to be the same when they are confronted with a crying child, who often has no choice but to adjust to adults' moods, patterns, and schedules.

My first four years as a mom convinced me that homeschooling is a way better choice for child development over any other pre-school or child care centre. This means constant and unhampered parental presence during the child's early years.

Though with brutal honesty, I was not completely present for my child from birth to-date. I am employed up until now, and my husband and I have agreed to a partial homeschool, partial trad school arrangement for our 4-yr old. There are a lot of factors that influence this decision (and many I wish to maintain private), even if my heart of hearts desires 101% availability for my son anytime, at all costs.

I confess that I delegated much of my mothering roles to nannies, who understandably had little to zero intention to mother my child. I was filled with guilt and confusion given the amount of time I spent outside home, when I knew that nearly all of my time should have been shared with my son. I had thought against hiring people to look after my then new-born, but still eventually decided in favour of such arrangement. Moreover, I had reservations about putting my son a bit too early in a structured classroom, but enrolled him anyway.

In the future, I dream of law(s) and lawmaker(s) that would incentivize mothers just for being mothers. Motherhood, is after all, the world's most subscribed, yet most undervalued profession. In a world where employment rate has a direct correlation with a country's GDP, incentivizing motherhood may be quite a far off reality.

I personally vote against putting children way too early in school for reasons cited below. These are published here not to plant dissent among parties who may think otherwise, but to encourage level-headed discourse on how to move forward in training our young.

I believe early childhood centres promote outsourcing of parenting - a role too personal others cannot easily assume. Dawn Fung, a Singaporean homeschooling mom said it best - "School teaching has more to do with management, and training a rotating group of students for short-term, contractual, subject-based basis."

In contrast, homeschooling provides parents with a time-rich environment to intimately know their child(ren)'s strengths, and how best to nurture such through parenting and homeschooling resources.

Full-time employment does not make this a possibility, and the parent-child relations happen in haphazard, unintentional timing close to bed time. And lost family time is lost forever. There is no app whatsoever invented so far to recover what is lost with man's most precious resource - time.

With no exaggeration, children grow up in the blink of an eye, and their need for a strong family support is most felt from 0 to 7 years old. During this crucial period of brain development and values formation, parents in a homeschooling environment can freely customise learning, which is so much more beneficial long-term for their child(ren) versus acquiring generic curriculum. Traditional schooling may also be brutal in (unintentionally) pitting child A versus child B academically - something that can be totally avoided if the child(ren) is/are showered with love and affection at home.

Further, research (Moore, 1973) concludes that child(ren)'s sensory, cognition, and auditory are not fully developed till age 8. According to Moore (1973), "Research evidence seems to validate the undesirability of placing children under 8 years in programs of cognitive emphasis which require consistent reasoning abilities. Contrary to this, warm and consistent proximity to one's parents until age 8 appeared to be a greater predictor of eventual stability and cognitive maturity than any special effort toward cognitive development."

I was introduced to this research by Dawn, and it was the first ever piece of study that brought me to tears. I had to let go of my cognitive functions and worries about finances and sustenance to reach the final pages. This research validates my deepest desires to spend most of my time and my self with my son - all thanks to the recent work arrangement that allows employees to work remotely. (*Note: The research is available in open access and hyperlinked above.)

The grandest news of all is this: there is no need for any elaborate professional or educational qualification to become a good parent. The call of duty is to be wholly and fully devoted to our child(ren)'s welfare. Home is and will always be the child(ren)'s first and best classroom, in the same manner that parents are and will always be their first and best teachers.

Reference:

Moore, R. S. (1973). The Dangers of Early Schooling: The Need to Reexamine Our Motives and Methods. Paper presented at the symposium on "Man - Centered" Physiological Science and Medicine (Herdecke, West Germany, September 24-30, 1973)