Am I doing enough?

[5 Little Monkeys]

There is actually a push away from a more formal program and more freeplay anyways where activities are made available and the children choose to do them or not to do them rather than where the whole group is made to do the same things. In family care this sort of happens normally because each age group has their own agenda of learning they need to do.

I agree. This push has been happening for about the last 7 years or so. I am curious to those who have done both...which do you prefer? I personally like a combination of both. I feel that structured play has a place and teaches things like patience, how to follow directions, attention span, following rules and IMO the biggest one, sometimes we have to do things we don't necessarily want to do!(huge life lesson lol) I have been involved with childcare for the last 10 years and it is astounding to me to see the difference in the children and especially the parenting/ child behaviours. I sometimes wonder if this push for more free play and "doing what you want when you want how you want" (I know it's not quite like this but often I see this as the result) is the reason for some of the changes I have seen.

**just as a note, some of the things I mean by change in kids are....kids used to respect the teachers/dcp's, they had manners, they had attention spans, they wanted to do group activities and socialize(not just play one on one with their electronics), they knew the difference between right and wrong, they knew the rules and they followed them etc.