Educator in Bucharest at a private kindergarten, versus educator in Stockholm: My colleagues did not necessarily have education. What shocked me was that none of them had a first aid course / We only had to do activities that cost money, if we went to a park, which didn’t cost money, it wasn’t good

“I worked in a private kindergarten for six months and entered with a lot of enthusiasm and desire to show and do, especially since, theoretically, I was given to take care of the kindergarten, to come up with those ideas myself good from outside. And I hit some walls that I didn’t expect,” said educator Lia Stoica in an interview with Andrea Daraban from Radio Iași. With studies in preschool pedagogy at the University of Stockholm and 8 years of experience working with preschoolers and teenagers, both in Sweden and in Romania, Lia Stoica claims that in the kindergarten in Bucharest where she worked “I was struck by the fact that my colleagues didn’t necessarily have an education”

“I had several colleagues who had psychopedagogy studies or courses, one of them had also worked in the Montessori system, but I also had colleagues who were extraordinary women, but they did not have the foundation. The fact that you have a child at home does not necessarily make you a good pedagogue, in my view, and vice versa, know that I also agree with this. What shocked me was that none of them had a first aid course. We work with small children.

Children get injured, food sometimes gets stuck in their throats, we need to know how to act in such situations. I cannot tell parents: bring your children to us, when we simply cannot guarantee their safety. I did first aid courses annually in Sweden. We should all have some first aid courses, but when you work in education even more so”, the teacher draws attention.

Another aspect pointed out is that at the private kindergarten where he worked, the proposed activities outside the kindergarten should have cost. “We were only supposed to do activities that cost money. So if I went to a park, which didn’t cost money, it wasn’t good. The patron’s feeling was that we, the educators, when we were in the park with the children, sat on the bench and drank coffee, when in fact we were working more because I climbed all the slides and all the swings in that park. And I was also struck by the fact that some children, especially in the urban area, do not move, do not exercise.

I was shocked to see 5 year olds who couldn’t climb the rope ladder in the park. They were afraid and had never climbed because their parents were afraid of falling. (…) Brain development, everything cognitive, being able to write, being able to read, are directly correlated with physical movements. You can’t develop a child under a glass dome, not moving at all, but expect them to have some amazing school results. At least until they are 6 years old, they need a lot of physical exercise”, says Lia Stoica.

She spoke extensively about her experience in the Swedish education system.

What does a day in the life of a kindergarten teacher in Sweden look like?

Lia Stoica: I worked full-time, so I worked 8 hours/day, but I also had colleagues who worked 80%. The teacher is responsible for the group. For example, the last group I worked with had 25 children, including a little boy with autism, who was entitled to an accompanying pedagogue to work specifically with him. And I had two other colleagues, educators, who had completed the pedagogical high school.

You were four adults in a class of 25 children.

Lia Stoica: Yes, and one of the educators stayed with the autistic child 99% of the time, but they also came with us because at their place, children with disabilities or with certain problems are in mainstream education. Children with autism, the child with Down syndrome, even the child in a wheelchair, go to regular kindergartens precisely with the idea of ​​socialization. Because they have an enormous need, both typical children and those with SEN (special educational needs) to socialize with each other. At 6:30 the kindergarten opened, we received the children, ate breakfast from 7:30 to 8, and at 8 we were already getting dressed and going out into the yard. The yard of the kindergartens is large. Almost all kindergartens, even in big cities, in Stockholm for example, have a fairly large yard, which has space, sand and there should be a park nearby, if there is no forest.

We would sit in the yard until 9:00, when each group would eat the fruit, and then we would split up. I, for example, was walking one day with a third of the children in the forest. Another colleague was sitting a third inside and they had a project to do. We always had various projects, and the other teacher sat with the children in the yard together with the rest of the colleagues who stayed in the yard. When I went to the forest with the children, we had certain themes. In the fall we gather mushrooms or blueberries, we talk a lot about what is happening with nature, with the birds, how we should take care of nature. The children were running, perching in the trees.

I had certain projects that were semesters or even took place over the course of a year. We had very nice projects about the water cycle in nature, for example. After the nature walk, we all gathered at the kindergarten around 11:30, and lunch was served at 12. Children from 2 and a half to 3 years old no longer sleep in the afternoon in Sweden. But we had the moment to stay calm. I was reading a book, so that after lunch he would stay a little to calm down, and at 1:30 pm I would go out into the yard again.

And the sleeping children? There were some who were sleeping, I suspect.

Lia Stoica: Very young children, yes. The one-two-year-olds were sleeping. They had a room where some mattresses were spread on the floor. It was an ordinary room, not a special bedroom. In the activity room, some mattresses were simply spread out and they took their blankets and slept for about an hour. At other kindergartens, we had small children who sat outside in the wagon in the winter, so the children slept outside.

The others who did not sleep…

Lia Stoica: For 20 minutes we read after lunch, we talked, we had small talks, for another hour they did their little activities, which were not necessarily guided by us, so they were free activities. Around 13:30 we would change, go to the toilet and go out again.

And what time did the program end?

Lia Stoica: The kindergarten closed at 17:30 or 18:00. The children were picked up from kindergarten around 4:00 p.m., the vast majority.

So children start kindergarten at one year old and finish it at what age?

Lia Stoica: In the year they turn 6 they go to school and if they turn 6 in January, and if they turn 6 in December, that year they start grade zero in August.

Do children who finish kindergarten in Sweden have to acquire certain skills without which they cannot enter school?

Lia Stoica: Not. You don’t need anything. Obviously, there are certain skills that we pedagogues, teachers look at. At the same time, the parents go with the children to the pediatrician. There are certain mandatory annual visits related to motor skills, but they don’t have to know how to read or know how to add, no. We are talking about physical and cognitive abilities that can tell us that a child is developing at a normal rate. We also had children for whom we realized that something was not quite as it should be, and together with the parents, together with the doctors, we reached a diagnosis, for example, ADHD or dyslexia or autism, and then we worked a little extra or differently. But upon entering school, they don’t need to know anything in particular.

In the year in which they happened to enter the zero grade, already in June we gathered the children, went to the schools where they were assigned and met the future teachers. There are two teachers in the first grades, grade zero and grade one, and I knew the two future teachers and they could socialize, they could see what the school meant, what was expected of them, so that the transition wouldn’t be a big shock. Because from my studies and personal experience, I realized what a big shock it is for children when they go from kindergarten to school and then when they go from the 4th grade to the 5th grade. It seems to me that in Romania no real and serious importance is given to this passage.

What is the focus of preschool education?

Lia Stoica: They work hard and study all the time. At the same time, the other day I was reading that the Swedes realized that some children arrive at school and no longer have the same mobility and motor skills that they had until the last few years. That means maybe there’s too much emphasis on projects and other things going on in the classroom, instead of keeping a balance between going outside and working inside, and they just go back to that as well, ie as many activities as possible motion controlled.

The full interview, on radioiași.ro.

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