How you can know your child's hidden talents

One mum recalls the amazement she felt when her daughter started nursery school and revealed a previously hidden musical talent. The rest of her children were tone deaf and she had no idea her daughter had any appreciation of music. So it was a revelation when she came home from nursery singing a song. She knew all the words and carried the melody.

So what’s going on? Can nursery or pre-school reveal your child’s hidden talents?

Child-centered

School can reveal your child’s hidden talents. For one, she will learn skills at nursery or pre-school she wouldn’t learn at home. A school environment is focused on children’s needs, so it gives them more opportunity to focus on certain skills than a home might, where the needs of the child have to be juggled with the rest of the household. A busy parent might not have the time to supervise picture painting. Nursery school teachers also have the time to encourage children to try things for themselves. A harassed parent will often take over just for the sake of a quiet life.

Role models

Your child also learns from being with new people. A teacher or assistant teacher has no preconceptions about the children in her care. A mum may not encourage her child to experiment with pens because she thinks she can’t draw. The teacher looks at each child with fresh eyes. And it’s not only new adult faces the child benefits from - psychologists believe a child learns from her peers. Younger children use older children as role models. They might see them writing and try to copy by scribbling, taking steps to literacy.

Surprising skills

The main reason your child is learning surprising new talents is because of the host of new opportunities a nursery offers, from playing with new dress-up materials, to writing with soapsuds.

Many mums notice that their children’s social skills first really develop at nursery. For many children, it’s the first time they’ve functioned as part of a group or had to share with lots of children or meet strangers.

Some years back, most children would have grown up in a lively environment with many siblings and an extended family. They would also have played with neighbourhood children in the street. Now they live in smaller, more isolated units, and needs a chance to meet other people.

Learning to share

Psychologists say being part of a group at nursery school encourages children to learn about sharing and turn-taking and to develop feelings of compassion. Meeting different children also develops our child’s social skills. For instance, if there is a deaf child in class, other children learn a few phrases and start using sign language.

New creativity

Creative skills can come top of the list of surprising achievements when a child starts nursery school. This is because these settings usually offer many different opportunities, such as music-making, drama and model-making, for which many mums just don’t have the time or equipment at home. For some mums, though, it is a child’s new ability to read or write that impresses them most.

Home time

However, your child is also learning from you. At nursery, life is child-oriented. At home your child learns how to function in the real world. And because you’re her mum you’ll know what she really loves doing. So it’s likely that your child is surprising the nursery or pre-school staff, just as much as she’s surprising you.

The skills our child learns at nursery

Most nursery and pre-schools run activities split into six areas. Here are some skills your child will learn:

Personal and social development

*Independence *Social skills *Respect for others

Creative development

*Imagination *Knowledge or texture, colour, shapes *Self-expression

Physical development

*Coordination and strength *Spatial awareness *Problem-solving

Language and Literacy

*Listening and concentration *Reading and writing skills

Mathematics

*Learning about numbers *Understanding shapes, size, quantity