Six or seven: when is a child resilient enough to start school and to cope with the transition stress? Czech and polish experience: social policy and research outcomes
Abstrakt
A debate on when to start school has continued in the Polish education system for four years now. Until recently, children started school at the age of seven.
However, the comparison of the Polish education system with those of other European countries provoked wide public discussion on the necessity to amend the existing regulations. In the Czech Republic, the contrary idea is under discussion, namely whether to change the school starting age from six to seven years, which is due to a growing number of school postponement cases and maladaptation to school life.
In favour of the change in Poland, psychologists have put forward several main arguments, including intense natural cognitive interest demonstrated in early childhood, the effectiveness of involuntary (unintentional) learning and memory and small children's interest in writing and reading. The main arguments against the change emphasise that six-year-old children are not socially and emotionally mature to start school: they show insufficient emotional and behavioural self-regulation levels and have not developed strategies for coping with stress.
Current trends in the Polish and Czech educational systems will be discussed in the light of research on resilience with the emphasis on the outcomes that demonstrate how resilience develops.