HOW DOES A CHILD THINK? : You must have interacted with children of various ages. From your experience, do you feel that children start learning, from a very early age, and continue learning? Or, do you believe that children are a 'blank slate' when they enter formal school, and everything has to be taught to them in the school? In fact, children learn from anything and everything they see and act upon. They have learnt a lot before they join school, and they continue to learn outside the school hours. If we believe that children learn only in school, it is because of what we wrongly regard as learning. When a child spends hours on trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle (say), she is often reprimanded by adults for wasting study time. Little do the grown-ups realise that it is through such interesting games that this child may be increasing her understanding of shapes and size. And, this learning is taking place outside the. school hours, without formal instruction. A curriculum built upon assumptions about children's learning, that ignore this aspect, is also responsible for children losing interest in mathematics or in any formal learning.
From the time a child is born, her interaction with the world around her starts. She perceives things around her, and gradually makes sense of them. She slowly begins to recognise people and objects, relate more and more to the environment, and observe things through the senses of touch, sight, taste, smell and sound.
When an infant wanders around on the floor, picking up a tiny bit of dirt from the floor and sticking her finger into the tiniest hole, what is going on in her mind?
Isn't she asking herself questions, thinking up possible answers, making theories, hypothesising, and then testing her hypothesis by further questions or observations? This unending curiosity, continuous urge to make sense of the things around, and the power to explore makes the child an investigator, an explorer, a decision maker, a little scientist! And this is true of older children too!