Is your child compliant or do they do what they want to do?
/Earlier this week I took my son to a gymnastics trial lesson. It was at a little place called ‘The Little Gym’ in Hampstead. What I saw was fascinating and it made me think about the 4+ Assessments and what the Assessors see as they are walking around observing the children.
I imagined that if this was a 4+ Assessment, my son would have 100% failed!
It was a small group of 10 children all between the ages of 2 and 3. A mixture of boys and girls. There was one teacher who was excellent. She had prepared an incredible lesson with music and lots of activities for the children to do in the amazing gymnastics room. There was all sorts of equipment for the children to explore and enjoy.
We started as a group and the teacher did an activity which involved running in a circle. 5 children did this beautifully, followed her instructions perfectly and did exactly what they were told. The other 5 didn’t (including mine!)
One child started crying, another needed to go to the bathroom, another ran off into the gym and my son just froze and stood there with a scowl on his face. He refused to move. I observed as the teacher very kindly (and patiently) asked my son to hold her hand and follow her and he just looked at her and shook his head!
Then it was time for the activities. Again 5 of the children followed all of the instructions and did exactly what they were told to do.
One child pushed another child out of the way, another told the teacher that he wanted to go first, my son did not follow the instructions to complete the activity and made up his own! (they were supposed to walk on the balance beam and place the hoop on the correct coloured cone. He dodged the balance beam, ran to the cone, placed his hoop on a random coloured cone and gave himself a round of applause!
I could see that he had no interest at all in being compliant.
When the teacher called the group back to do an activity, he just ignored her and ran to whatever he wanted to do.
Can you see how is absolutely wouldn’t have passed if this was an Assessment? And can you see how the others perhaps would have?
Your child will need to go into their 4+ Assessments and be compliant so if they are not able to do this yet, practise it with them. You still have some time. Sign them up to some classes and help them to learn how to be compliant.
