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Sunday, September 1, 2013

nursery school hysteria - my sidewalk chalk blog - nyc school help

nursery school hysteria - my sidewalk chalk blog - nyc school help:

nursery school hysteria

Here is the problem. There are many people in a small space who all want passionately, and they want it NOW. Their main source of information is other people in the same boat who have a lot of fear but no accurate information or experience.
Here is the result. Unnecessary fear, misunderstanding, rigidness that creates hysteria, promotes wrong headed decisions and sets up a climate that is unhealthy for the schools, the children and the parents. You are doing it to yourselves, people.
Here is the reality. There are many appropriate and lovely early childhood seats available (enough for everyone evidenced by the range of stand alone private schools with open seats throughout the summer, many of which I list on my newsletter each year). I just can't buy into the myth when every year, I see popular schools, small schools, large schools, new and old that have seats available even into the fall. This is NOT A HIGH STAKES CHOICE. It is playbased inquiry and enrichment. You need to find someplace that is safe, loving and rich in experience (there are multitudes of schools that fill these requirements - hundreds in a few square miles in fact) and after that you will look at