Nursery World - Opinion: To the point

Have no fear, says Julian Grenier, head of Kate Greenaway Nursery School and Children's Centre, London.

On New Year's Eve, the Guardian reported that 14 under-fives are excluded daily for violence against teachers or fellow pupils. We should, of course, expect under-fives to have the greatest difficulties in behaving acceptably in school. Many young children have passionate feelings, with little thought for consequences. Yet this has usually been balanced with a strong desire to please adults, to be liked and accepted in school.

So what might be causing the present problems? Some possible answers will come quickly: the increasing pressure on little children to learn to read and write through formal instruction, the stresses experienced by parents as they try to combine work with family life, perhaps the growing targeting of children by advertisers.

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