Memoir from my graduate school practicum journal written while acquiring my Masters degree in Educational Foundations and working as a site coordinator at a private early childhood /school age school: Posted to inspire others………
Children rely on adults to be a positive force within their lives. Positive role models provide the stability within a young child’s life that inevitably jettisons them towards positive self-efficacy, and provides them with the confidence needed to attempt safe challenges. Safe challenges are intended to assist a child in learning new skills that provide a mild degree of effort, yet are not so far out of reach that the child cannot master the new skill. Having a balance when introducing a new learning skill to a child is non-negotiable. If the task is to difficult for the child, the child will give up and withdraw. If the task is to simple, the child will soon become bored and lose interest with the activity. If we do not provide the child with developmentally appropriate challenges, the child may never rise to their optimum skill level. In essence, safe challenges are merely layering a skill learned, with a new skill that is one step above knowledge that the child has already acquired. (Read More)
See the compete original article at : https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/delicate-balance-pushing-children-beyond-comfort-zone-mari