Which do our 7 year-olds need most, asks Ben Fogle in a recent Guardian article.
He begins:
Government plans to introduce national tests for seven-year-olds shows just how far our exam obsession has come. Our kids now face constant assessment as politicians attempt to measure the success of schools. Children have become tiny cogs in a box-ticking government machine. Education has lost its way.
This matters to me a great deal, especially since becoming a father to Ludo, five, and Iona, four. I don’t want my children to feel the same sense of failure I did growing up because they’re not good at passing tests. …
Fogle quotes a study by the American Medical Association in 2005 which concluded that:
“Children will be smarter, better able to get along with others, healthier and happier when they have regular opportunities for free and unstructured play in the out-of-doors.”
We think this is a good New Year message.