Free play?

It feels like the whole of early childhood is divided.  Playgroups think Playcentre is too demanding of parents, Playcentre thinks Kindergarten is too structured for kids and the ratios too high, Kindergarten thinks Steiner is too structured and Steiner feel that Montessori creates mini business tycoons.  Well that is my summation after discussions lately.

We are still finding our way since arriving back in NZ as to the best choice of groups for our kids.  As mentioned in our blogs we have decided not to continue with Playcentre as, for me, the dynamics at our centre and the lack of any structure (Free Play) just didn't fit well.  Our oldest also goes to Kindy, one day of which we've dropped due to starting our Steiner playgroup, and we all seemed really happy with it.  That is until a second incident occurred within the 10 weeks that she has been going.

I understand that things happen and you can't always be there it was just the way that all, except one, teacher reacted to it that shocked me.  In discussing it with them they basically told me to not think about it and the more I did the more my child would 'feed' me what ever story I wanted!!! Along with this was an explanation of how different Steiner and Kindergarten are and that only doing one day at Kindy would be hard on our oldest.  She wouldn't be able to settle or know names lectured one teacher while the next told me that I just had to deal with the fact that accidents happen and re-settle her.  The mixture of free play at Kindy and structure at Steiner would be confusing said one while the other re-iterated how cunning and quick to adjust to situations kids can be.

My big question is has the term 'free play' now just become an excuse for letting the kids do whatever they want whenever they want even when it disturbs or disrupts others?  Why is it that educators feel that they can talk to parents as if they are idiots while building up a wall to ensure that they are not accountable for anything? Their talk of free play just equates to lack of interest on their behalf to act as educators.