Task 11.
1) Pre-school education can be defined as Infant education.
2) In British English a term "nursery school" is not used.
3) In American English a term "pre-school" and and Pre-K are used.
4) Pre-school work is organised within a framework that professional educators create.
5) The framework involves includes structural (administration, class size, student - teacher ratio, services, etc.), process (quality of classroom environments, teacher-child interactions, etc.), and alignment (standards, curriculum, assessments) components that are associated with each individual unique child that has both social and academic outcomes.
6) The first pre-school institution was founded in 1816 by Robert Owen.
7) The term "kindergarten" was introduced by Friedrich Frobel.
8) Development areas in pre-school education comprise personal, social, economic, and emotional development; communication, including sign language, talking and listening; knowledge and understanding of the world; creative and aesthetic development; educational software; mathematical awareness and development; physical development; physical health; playing; teamwork; self-help skills; social skills; scientific thinking; creative arts; literacy; speaking ability.
9) Developmental learning is allowing pre-school aged children to discover and explore freely within each of these areas of development.
10) The NAEYC published results of its research, it shows that although 80% of Kindergarten classrooms claim to be developmentally appropriate, only 20% actually are.
Task 13.
1) What periods of human life are best suited for learning?
a) they begin at birth
b) adulthood
c) adolescence
d) teenage
2) What is physiological explanation of ability to learn more in early age?
a) human brain is making connections that last for whole life
b) human brain could absorb more information in early years of life
c) human brain could absorb more information due to its large amount which decreases within years
d) human brain could not make a large amount of connections than it is prescribed by physiology
3) What is the role of pre-school education?
a) to have short-term effect on disadvantaged child
b) to have a long-term emotional effect
c) to have a short-term physical developmental effect
d) to have a long-term improving effect
4) What are the results acquired by Stanford University about pre-school education?
a) pre-school education does much to improve co-operation
b) though pre-school establishments help to develop cognitive skills, they do not have any progress in social development
c) pre-schools are preoccupied with social development and co-operation but do not concentrate their attention on pre-reading and math
d) pre-school establishments improve social development but do not improve cognitive skills
5) What does Universal Pre-school movement fight for?
a) to prohibit pre-school education and compulsory primary education
b) to give equal rights for pre-school education as it is for compulsory primary education
c) to make compulsory primary education voluntary as well as pre-school education
d) to make pre-school education and compulsory primary education start at the same age
6) What is the main approach at pre-school education?
a) scientific skills development
b) environmental education
c) teacher-free education
d) developmentally appropriate practice
Task 14.
1) Different cultures have the same or similar forms of preschool education. False. Pre-school education, like all other forms of education, is intended by the society that controls it to transmit important cultural values to the participants. As a result, different cultures make different choices about pre-school education.
2) In Japan, main aim of pre-school is to develop sense of belonging. True.
3) Classes are small, about four students per class. False. Class sizes tend to be large, up to 40 students per class.
4) Large class in Japan leads to decreasing teacher's role. True.
5) People in Japan are taught from childhood to be intolerable toward different behaviour. True.
6) If a child is just standing near and watching others perform an activity, he is still considered to participate in it and to belong to this group. True.
7) Major desirable qualities in Japanese children and adults are collectivism, kindness and social consciousness. False. Children are expected to be learned how to work harmoniously in large and small groups, and to develop the praiseworthy qualities of childhood, such as cooperativeness, kindness, and social consciousness.
8) When children play by themselves it is not praised. False. Unstructured, lightly supervised time to play freely with other children is valued
9) Usually Japanese teachers take a hands-on approach. False. Teachers take a hands-off approach.
10) When children are fighting teachers try to stop them. False. Teachers take a hands-off approach to most disputes between children, including physical fighting.
11) Japanese teachers use gentle care and careful attention instead of punishment. True.
12) Teachers take into consideration mainly less-able children and ignore high-performing children. True.
13) Japanese pre-school organisations are preoccupied with teaching academic subjects rather than emotional development. False. Although a wide variety of attitudes and educational philosophies exist in Japanese pre-schools, most pre-schools focus on age-appropriate personal development, such as learning empathy, rather than academic programmes.
14) Christian pre-schools in Japan concentrate their attention on learning empathy. False. Academic programmes tend to be more common among Christian pre-schools in Japan
Task 15.
In China, a vast and varied country, the pre-school programmes are highly variable. Some amount to little more) than babysitting service, and others are university-run programs with high-quality curricula. Some are showpieces designed to impress foreign visitors, and others have very limited facilities and resources. The qualifications of stuff members and their beliefs about early childhood education are also highly variable. Many are associated with an employer, and some provide overnight care during the week, frequently reserving these slots for parents who work at night or in jobs requiring travel. However, a few themes are common to most Chinese pre-schools: Chinese parents' traditional concerns about spoiling their children have intensified since the introduction of the one-child policy: Only children are widely seen as lonely, selfish, and prone to anti-social behaviours. Parents, however, feel somewhat reluctant to discipline their only children, thinking it may cause resentment and ultimately an unwillingness to care for the parents in their old age. Teachers, therefore, are seen as professionals whose primary responsibility is to counteract the parents' natural tendency to indulge their children and the unfortunate effects of the one-child policy, and thus produce well-behaved children who benefit society. Children are taught to behave as part of orderly, regimented collective that is obedient to its leader. For example, children eat meals silently and sit quietly for long periods of time during the school day.
Task 16.
Unlike the Japanese programmes, group dynamics are authoritarian and vertical, with the relationship between the teacher and the children more important than the relationships between the children. Teachers intervene very early to stop inappropriate behaviour before it escalates to disruption, usually by verbally criticising the child's behaviour. Positive reinforcement through publicly praising examples of proper behaviour is typical. Programmes permit little unstructured time and emphasise academic development. For example, a lesson may have children use building blocks to construct pre-determined structures exactly matching a printed diagram, rather than to build anything they wish. Academic progress is valued, as parents believe this will result in the child being economically successful later in life. Parents in Taiwan have similar attitudes in many respects, and many of the concerns and goals related to child rearing in the modern era echo those found in ancient Confucian writings.