San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1925-12-07
Listen, World!
Before Six
BY Elsie Robinson

Suppose you had been slugging
away, twelve hours a day for an in
definite number of weeks studying
French, math, philosophy, the theory
of color, the fundamentals of music,
and, at the same tine, taking lessons
in tight rope walking and sleight of
hand for several hours a day. And
suppose you were in strange coun-
try, whose inhabitants spoke Ian
guage and lived in a manner that was
most confusing to you.
- Then suppose that one day, after
five hours of this complicated and
arduous work, while you were right
at the peak of some problem with
every nerve tensed to solve it, a
Great Hand grabbed you and shook
you and an angry voice yelled in your
ears, demanding to know why you
didn't pay attention when you were
spoken to-"
Would you be shocked, bewildercd
and angered?
Would you feel most unjustly
treated?
You certainly would.
Yet that is exactly what you do &c
three year old Oracle almost every
day.
Oracle is living in q world as
strange as the one described above
and doing even more difficult things.
She is performing an amount of wori
in limited time which you couldn't
possibly equal ct. your age, with the
equipment and control which you con-
slider so superior to hers. Mary Ross
tells about little Gracie's world in her
article Before Six" printed in the
October issue of The Survey.
She says: when an automobile
charges a hill, DIR. Arnold Gesell Cat
the Yale Pchycho-C linic) points out, it
goes most rapidly at the start and
slows up progressively as it gains on
the incline. Similarly the development
Of child is most rapid Mt the very
beginning of life. 1t -slackens grad
ually and progressively through the
period of CESSATION, infancy and child
hood until he makes--or does not make
the adult grade.
"On the educational sidel child
performs the amazing feat df acquir-
ing and perfecting Language by the
time he is six, and lays thu founda-
tons OF his ideas of the fbmily, OF
sex, of money, of birth aid death,
and most Of the other more or less
insoluble problems of the human race.
On the physical side, he developed
from a tiny germ to human being
whose brain has attained practically
its adult weight. He has lebrned the
intricate feats of balance necessary
for walking; he has acquired a GER
tain amount of control over his five
senses, and an amount of muscular
coordination that would nut some
adults to shame. In the first six years
DR.. Gesell believes the Development
of the child is treble that Of the sue
ceeding twelve years.
This tremendous speed Of develop
ment carries with it proportionate
risks. One third of all the deaths of
the nation occur before six years of
age, and there are twice as many
deaths during the five years of pre-
school life as during the following
ten years of school life. By the time
II Cuiiu 10 Icuut iOT SCuOOl u SuTpTlS-
ing amount Of his whole life's course
has been determined. Practically every
case of mental deficiency is present
and recognizable during the pre-school
years. Three quarters of all the deaf,
a considerable portion of the blind,
one third of all the crippled and more
than three quarters of all those de-
fective in speech come to their handi-
cap during this period. Tendencies to
tantrums or running away OF other
conduct disorders have often been as.
tablishcd. At the end of the first year
of public school one-quarter Of all
beginners fail of promotion.
This is the tremendously difficult |
Job which our 'helplcss, soft, ignorant |
little babies" are tackling. It is a job |
which might well cause sage or a |
to cry quits, vet these ten
der weaklings get by with it.
They get by with it in spite of the
fact that we complicate and interrupt |
1t in thousand ways by our stupidity |
and cruelty--by our mushiness and
our malice, our arm yankings and ear
bookings, our pettings and peeves, our
irritable answers and unreasonable re-
our neglect and hysteria.
Stop and think how you'd feel II
you were treated when you're in the |
midst of a man sized job, as you |