When I was in primary school I was all the time swotting over never-ending piles of homework during term-time. Have things changed today? The answer is no. State schools and most Church schools load their students with reams of homework and complex projects, giving children no time to play.
In an interview in The Sunday Times of Malta, Children’s Commissioner Pauline Miceli pleaded for “less loaded subjects” and asked for “more discussion in class”. What she is suggesting, in fact, already exists. The Commissioner needs to look at the model of independent, non-profit organisation schools such as San Anton and San Andrea and encourage other schools to apply their teaching methods. At these schools, children at primary level are given the time to talk about current issues and are given only a minimal amount of homework, just enough for parents to get a feel of what is being tackled.
I worried though, when the Commissioner voiced her disagreement on the learning by rote methods. “There’s a lot of memory work involved and critical thinking is not being encouraged,” she said.
Memory work, I strongly believe, is extremely important for children because it lays down the foundations of structure. Learning by rote: times tables, poems, quotes are crucial training for the brain. (How else would I otherwise recall William Henry Davies’ Leisure most beautiful: ‘What is this life if, full of care/We have no time to stand and stare’). Let’s face it, do we need our children to be critical thinkers at the age of five? Are we so desperate for child Einsteins?
The Children’s Commissioner argued that if children want facts, they can “switch on your internet and find the numbers”. No. I want my daughter to know that the Great Siege took place in 1565. And that World War II ended in 1945. Without a sound bed of facts, how can our children build an argument and how can they become versant in good conversation?
The problem is not learning by rote, it is the lack of free play. The desire for outdoor play is still strong in many children – I take it from my daughter and her friends. Give them a choice between watching a movie at the cinema and running around in the wooded part of Ta’ Qali and the latter wins hands down. It’s fascinating watching them play from a distance: setting up home bases, forts, defending their territory.
Our children are being raised cooped up like animals in a zoo. Then, suddenly when they’re teenagers we are letting them loose
While all the after-school activities such as athletics, ballet, piano lessons and scouts give children important skills, they do not give the benefits of undirected outdoor play, where they make the rules for themselves, reach agreements and make compromises without any adult intervention – secure in the knowledge that they are within sight and sound of their parents should they feel in any way threatened or if they’ve fallen over and grazed a knee.
Yet how much of this do we give our children? We do not really go on picnics any longer, we go to restaurants and give children tablets to entertain themselves. And then we wonder why they are addicted to screen-time. Our children, I’m afraid, are being raised cooped up like animals in a zoo. Then, suddenly when they’re teenagers we are letting them loose, without any training whatsoever.
The Commissioner, rightly so, touched upon the lack of safe and adequate spaces for young people to congregate. “Paceville, with its string of strip clubs, was not suitable for young people.”
She has observed a number of youths gathering in Valletta recently. “But then we started hearing complaints. Adolescents have nowhere to go since the shops are closed, so they tend to get into trouble,” she said. The problem is not that the shops are closed – it would be a problem in itself if shopping is the only thing that keeps teens happily occupied – but the reason for the complaints.
Young people gathering in Valletta are not playing their guitars in manner of the Italian youths in Piazza di Spagna in Rome. The Commissioner may want to look into the fact that these gatherings of young 13- and 14-year-olds are drinking copious amounts of alcohol, having unprotected sex and bullying passers-by.
After a decade of homework and cooped up at home, this is the only way they can express themselves.
• The Children’s Commissioner office will shortly be publishing guidelines for political parties in relation to how children are used in electoral campaigns and adverts. Might I also suggest she issues guidelines on how parents speak to children about politics at home? At the moment we oscillate from “Shh! Ara ma nkunx naf li tkellimt fuq politika!” to telling three-year-olds to point at political leaders and say “Dak jaqq”. Surely, we can talk politics to our children in a dignified, respectable manner? Please get out the guidelines now.
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Twitter: @KrisChetcuti