Finding the Middle, Early

I read an interesting Huffington Post Blog today about the need for early childhood to be a major world-wide focus in order to ensure positive global development in the future.

Find the article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/todd-grindal/the-next-stage-of-global-_b_3978868.html

The article points out that in the last 20 years, there have been major increases in children attending primary schools across the world. However, there has been less progress with enrolling children in “proven early childhood development programs” worldwide.

The authors then go on to discuss the importance of a strong early childhood to build a foundation for later healthy growth and development, and the links to a successful global workforce and economy. They outline the importance of healthcare, parental support, and basic nutrition as being major factors early in life that can substantially impact later academic, behavioral, and global economic success.

All of this is fairly straightforward to me. It’s the party line I’ve heard (and have generally subscribed to) from day one of my studies in child development.

However, something of this post smacked a little too much of the idea that there is only “one right way” to do something for my taste.

Though I certainly understand the benefits and values of early childhood supports and education, and fully support the need to expand resources for families who are at-risk for highly preventable mental and physical health conditions, the idea that “proven early childhood development programs” are the one, and perhaps only way to go makes me a little leery.

 

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Especially when we’re taking a world-wide focus on the issue, focusing in on early childhood programs, which in many places are nationally funded and/or monitored, seems a little short-sited. Though I fully understand the importance of evidence-base in developing programs and interventions, I also know that science is one, but not the only, way of knowing something is good for kids.

Don’t get me wrong; it drives me nuts when people assume that they know everything that I know about child development just because they have kids. But it also drives me nuts when scientists claim to know everything about children when they’ve never worked directly with them outside of a laboratory setting one day in their lives.

There are generalizable realities in the human condition, to be sure. And science can help elucidate some of that generalizability.

But it is not, nor should it be, the end all and be all, largely because the field of child development has not studied everything in and across every world culture. There are nuances, differences, and beautiful variations in the way in which humans approach and experience the world around them. Science has a tendency to trounce on that beauty and chalk it up to “variations” or “outliers” that either aren’t important enough to explore, or are just noise in an otherwise coherent data set.  

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This just in: Science doesn’t know it all.

And that’s okay. Frankly, it’d be a pretty boring world if we did know it all. Plus, all the scientists out there would have to pack their bags and go home if there was nothing else to learn.

My point here is that though science has incredible value and can shed light on some of the most complex things in our world, it is not the only answer.

“Evidence-based” isn’t, and shouldn’t be the only way.

There are a lot of ways to do things right. There are a lot of ways to know the right thing to do. There are a lot of ways to get to the same positive outcome. ‘Because science says so’ is one of many valid reasons to do something.

I’d just hate to think that we’re getting to a place where nations institute a 'one and only right way' to raise children, based solely on what science tells us. That mindset is limiting, and squashes the beautiful variations inherent in the human race.

Now, I don’t mean to be an alarmist. Nor do I mean to suggest that the authors of this article don’t recognize the value in other ways of knowing, or the variation in culture that may be lost in a more one-size-fits-all approach.

But I worry that there are people who may read this article, and who may subscribe fully to the belief that universal, evidence-based early childhood education is the only way to “correctly” raise children. And the more early childhood education gets entangled with state and federal policy and funding, the more this belief will become intractably instilled in our collective psyche.

But instead, let’s call this what it is. Early childhood education programs are a very western idea of child-rearing. And that's okay. But that doesn't make it suitable for the whole world. 

So I fear we are again getting into a situation where the West thinks it knows the “right way” to raise children, to the detriment of other less powerful, but equally vibrant cultures throughout the world that might raise their children differently.  

Children (via stock.xchng)

It’s a hard line to walk because on the one hand, there are certainly universal things that are very detrimental to the successful development of a child. Poor health and nutrition, traumatic experience, lack of family support and connection, mental illness, violence, the list goes on. And there are things that early childhood supports can do to help buffer against those negative early life experiences and enhance the lives of young children. Some of those supports are early interventions and quality early childhood care. Raising global awareness of these things is a laudable goal. 

But on the other hand, where do we stop? Quality is important, to be sure, but if certain cultural beliefs and practices are not in the “evidence-based curriculum” does the funding stop? Where does the western world draw the line on what’s an acceptable way to spend taxpayer dollars? What does it deem as “okay”? What’s defined as “not good enough”? Who decides?

These are the questions I fear we haven’t discussed enough.

And I worry that it will be the loud, powerful voices of western thinking demolishing all others in their path without careful consideration of what might be lost in the process.

And that sounds eerily familiar, and feels a little like groundhog day.

What do you think? Are we just repeating history all over again? Or will we find a middle ground, early?