What’s “good” got to do with it?
Every so often a quote from Fred Rogers comes up in my Facebook newsfeed. In a 1981 episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighbourhood (PBS, n.d.), Rogers is colouring and says to the audience, “I’m not very good at it, but it doesn’t matter, it’s just the fun of doing it that’s important” (InstantTrain, 2021, 0:26). This quote resonated with me because I really enjoy doing a lot of things that I’m not necessarily very “good” at.
We tend to have this idea in western culture that we’re only good at something if we can commodify it, or do it at a professional level. I’m a decent musician. Not good enough to make a living at it, but I still find musical things to do because I enjoy it. Could I be a professional painter? Probably not, but I still enjoy creating art.
I think this narrow definition of what it means to be good at an activity is something that we, as ECEs, are perfectly situated to change for future generations. I have worked with children over the years who have decided that they don’t like doing something because they don’t think they’re good enough at it. One of the principles in BC’s Early Learning Framework (ELF) says that children are strong and capable, so part of our job as educators is to facilitate learning that instills in the child a sense of self-confidence (ELF, 2019). Encouraging children to do things just for the enjoyment of doing it teaches them that they don’t have to be good at everything. You can still have a lot of fun doing something that you’re average at. I know I do.
The ELF also reminds us to be aware of what our images of children and childhood are (2019). We all have different experiences which shape how we work with children. We should also keep in mind that different cultures prioritize different things at different ages, and we must account for that in our interactions with children (James, 1998). Children will have varying levels of ability based on cultural differences and what skills/activities families incorporate into daily routines.
In the childcare setting, I must disagree with Rogers when he says “I’m not very good at it” while working with children. Many of the things we do with children, like art, are so subjective that it’s impossible to evaluate whether it’s good or not. Who decided what “good” is?
If we are creating art with a child and we tell them “I’m not very good at it,” I feel it could undermine their self-confidence a little. Due to our fine motor development, we are likely to be more able to draw a horse that looks like a horse than a young child will be. If I say that I’m not good at drawing a horse, but my horse looks more realistic than the child’s, they may feel bad about their skill level.
I believe that while working with children we could say something more along the lines of “I’m not sure how to do it, but I enjoy trying to figure it out,” or “mine isn’t the same as my friend’s, but I’m still having fun making it.” If a child says “Hannah, your horse doesn’t look like a horse,” I would blow it off and just say, “Oh well. I’m having fun making it,” because Rogers was right when he said, “it’s the fun of doing that’s important.”
References
British Columbia Ministry of Education, Ministry of Children and Family Development, and Ministry of Health. (2019). British Columbia Early Learning Framework. https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/education/early-learning/teach/earlylearning/early_learning_framework.pdf
InstantTrain. (2021, March 24). Drawing (subtitled) – Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2zJVZsXW3M
James, A. (1998). From the child’s point of view: Issues in the social construction of childhood. In Panter-Brick (Ed.), Biosocial perspectives on children (pp. 45-65). Cambridge University Press.
PBS. (n.d.). How people make crayons. Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. https://ww.pbs.org/video/mister-rogers-neighborhood-competition-how-people-make-crayons/
Hi Hannah,
Thanks for sharing.
I found myself chuckling and smiling through out your post because it is so relatable. I have dedicated a lot of my time to un-learning some of the things I was taught at such an early age; such as super independency, perfection, production and quickly moving on from a thing I’ve mastered so I can find the next thing I found worthy of taking up. It is only within the last few years I’ve indulged in slowing down to enjoy the process; rather than trying to perfect something I enjoy, I am constantly working on slowing down and figuring out what the ACT of slowing down looks like? how does it align with my values and beliefs? how are some of the things I hold so closely to my heart as an ECE directly correlated to how I choose to live my life?
I do believe there is tremendous importance in collectivity, connection and community. How do we move as a collective? how are we able to work alongside each other in our differences? how are some of the ways we hold places of tension for children to slow down, share ideas and work through a thought they may have together?
You have shared such an important message; how the language we use with children matter. What stories do they tell? What messaging are we giving children? how can we open the space for dialogue? I appreciate the way you rephrased the sentence to lead with more curiosity and courage.
when you said ‘If I say that I’m not good at drawing a horse, but my horse looks more realistic than the child’s, they may feel bad about their skill level.’ I thought how naturally that may come about in conversation with children; what are some of the consequences of language and the desire to keep moving? what images do we continue to unknowingly perpetuate by never slowing down to enjoy the most simple things that bring us joy?
Thanks again, Hannah.
Hi Sadaf, thanks for your response.
I agree that as an adult it’s been difficult to slow down on certain things. When I took my ECE diploma in Calgary one of my professors really focused on that. He talked a lot about how part of his job in this course was to teach us to unlearn these habits that wouldn’t be conducive to working with children. He focused a lot on having us do silly things in class to help us let go of what we thought we should act like because as ECEs we would need to be able to be silly and playful with the children. We would typically be working in a classroom with at least one other adult. If we weren’t comfortable enough with ourselves to be silly in front of our classmates, would we be able to do it in the classroom where other adults were present? Would we stop engaging with a child just because a parent had entered the room?
Being in that class really helped me start to letting go of things that were maybe a little less necessary than I had been raised to believe. I like what you said about letting our ECE values cross into our everyday lives. If I want to encourage the children to be less concerned about skill level and enjoy the process, I should give myself permission to do the same.
Another thing that that professor taught me was being aware of how we’re phrasing things with children because they interpret things differently. That was reinforced when I read an article about Fred Rogers’ manner of speaking on his program. He put so much thought into communicating with intent. It’s really interesting. I’ll link it here if you want to read it.
https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/mr-rogers-neighborhood-talking-to-kids/562352/
Thank you for sharing this, like Sadaf much of this resonated with me – independency, striving for perfection. Over the years I have gotten better at trying to slow down, take moments and experiences as they come and learn from those that challenged me, as Michelle Obama has said, “failure is part of the process…” (I can’t remember the rest of the quote but that is what stuck with me, the process).
As an educator, I have been working to be aware of the language I use, particularly around ability and trying new things. Two events I experienced as a child have greatly influenced my practice early on. When in kindergarten I FAILED cutting, it was written like that on my report card in capital letters and red pen. Later I was sharing the story with another educator and a child listening nearby responded “You can cut, I have seen you cutting!” No mention of being ‘good at cutting’, they saw me cut and that was enough. I have never felt so validated😊 . The second event, my grade 2 class was competing in the Kiwanis music festival. Everyone in the class was supposed to sing, however the teacher felt that some of us were out of tune, so she asked us during practice to ‘mouth the words if tapped on the shoulder’ during the competition, which we did – I was in that out of tune group. Winning was more important for her – the commodity (we didn’t win by the way). I was devastated, I loved music and singing, but I pretty much stopped at that point, and it was years before I was able to sing with friends or even in the car – I just couldn’t do it, not even for fun. To this day I fill with fear if someone suggests we do karaoke. These were just tiny moments in comparison to the horrors Indigenous peoples have experienced as a result of residential schools, but I think they highlight that even within the tiniest moment our words and actions as educators have lasting effects.
Over the years and through lots or reading and re-reading, I have come to believe that so much of the “not good enough” thinking comes from the progress and development narratives so prominent in our educational systems. These dominant approaches to education are steeped in Euro-Western practices that often reinforce self/other binaries (along with a host of others – nature/culture, subject/object) (see Burman, 2016; Cannella, 1997; Dahlberg et al., 2013) and I think that can put us into unrealistic comparisons with one another. Further, these static, linear, and normative conceptions of ability and competence witness children’s growth (such as meeting drawing milestones or cutting a straight line) through a succession of predictable, and measurable, developmental trajectories (see Piaget, 1952; Vygotsky, 1978) that often result in a standardization of educational practices upholding a particular social, cultural, economic, and political childhood (see Land et al., 2020; Moss & Urban, 2020; Pacini-Ketchabaw et al., 2015). If you are not that ‘particular’ child, then you or your work is considered ‘not good enough’ or less than, and that type of thinking can become quickly internalized by children and adults alike. As educators we have a responsibility to disrupt these narratives and create educational practices that are responsive to the situations and contexts we find ourselves. At the end of the article you linked, King (2018) has written in reference to the Mister Roger’s Neighbourhood script, “…every detail in it was the product of a tremendously careful, academically informed process” (para. 12). This is a good reminder as educators – tremendously careful and informed process, although I would argue we need to pay careful attention to who or what type of system might be informing the process.
(*I thought a lot about educational systems when starting to write my MEd project so some of this paragraph is from that writing.)
References
Burman, E. (2016). Deconstructing developmental psychology (3rd ed.). Routledge Ltd. http://doi.org/10.4324/9781315727127
Cannella, G. S. (1997). Deconstructing early childhood education: Social justice and revolution.
Peter Lang Publishing.
Dahlberg, G., Moss, P., & Pence, A. R. (2013). Beyond quality in early childhood education and care: Languages of evaluation. Routledge. http://doi.org/10.4324/9780203966150
Land, N., Vintimilla, C. D., Pacini-Ketchabaw, V., & Angus, L. (2020). Propositions toward educating pedagogists: Decentering the child. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 1-13. http://doi.org/10.1177/1463949120953522
Moss, P., & Urban, M. (2020). The organisation for economic co-operation and development’s international early learning and child well-being study: The scores are in. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 21(2), 165-171. http://doi.org/10.1177/1463949120929466
Pacini-Ketchabaw, V., Taylor, A., Blaise, M., & de Finney, S. (2015). Learning how to inherit in colonized and ecologically challenged life worlds in early childhood education: An introduction. Canadian Children, 40(2), 3-8. https://doi.org/10.18357/jcs.v40i2.15174
Piaget, J. (1952). The origin of intelligence in children. International University Press Inc.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Interaction between learning and development. In M. Cole, V. John- Steiner, S. Scribner, & E. Souberman (Eds.), Mind and society: The development of higher psychological processes (pp. 79-91). Harvard University Press.
Hi Sherri-Lynn,
Your story about music really resonated with me! Despite being relatively good at music, solos have always terrified me. Maybe I grew up around too many professional-level musicians. That might have made me over-aware of not being a professional-level musician, and therefore nervous about it. Some friends invited me to karaoke, and I love karaoke, so that was fine (despite the fact that they’re both professional singers), but then some other professional musician friends showed up and all I could think was “oh noooooo I didn’t know they’d be here!” Our measure of good is all relative. Other less musically-inclined people think I’m a great singer. Due to my experience level, I know I’m almost always slightly flat. I might have to engage in more immersion therapy for my karaoke issues.
I like what you said about paying attention to what systems are informing our practice. One of my professors, Samantha Wylie, was talking about child development theories and cultural contexts, and asked who came up with these theories. I said, “old white men” to which she countered, “dead white men.” I realized that she was completely right! Why hasn’t the book been re-written since Piaget and Vygotsky were studying development? They made very valid points, but the world has changed since 1952. Even if all their work were still 100% right, we’re living and working in a different context now. We need to look at their work with a more historical lens, if that makes sense. I honestly don’t know what their teaching about ages, stages, and milestones in ECE programs now, but I don’t think we should rely as much on checklists as we used to. They’re useful, but only when we’re mindful of how and why we’re using them.