I strongly agree with this article that the growth of a child’s mind is far more important than knowledge. Therefore, I share it with you! Germans have won half of the total number of Nobel Prizes. Through state intervention, the German constitution prohibits premature intellectual development of children, avoiding turning children’s brains into hard drives and leaving more room for imagination. The “only task” for children before elementary school is to grow up happily. 1, basic social awareness; 2, hands-on skills; 3, to protect the child’s emotional embryo, pouring emotional intelligence, should not over-develop the child’s intelligence. I thought that in Germany only children in kindergarten were not allowed to learn specialized knowledge, but later I found out that children in elementary school are not allowed to learn additional lessons, even if they have an IQ higher than their peers. Sandra from Cologne writes: “My son is 7 years old this year and I asked the school teacher if I could teach him something extra because he learned basic reading, writing and simple mathematical calculations at home by himself when he was 5-6 years old. The teacher objected and said, “You should keep your child up to date with other children”. A week later I went to see the teacher again and showed her the certificate of my child’s high IQ, hoping for her understanding and support, but the teacher looked at me in a strange way, as if I was someone from an alien planet.” The teacher went on to explain that it is not a good thing for a child’s intelligence to be overdeveloped, as it is necessary to leave room for the child’s brain to imagine. Too much knowledge can turn a child’s brain into a hard drive for a calculator, and if this continues, the child’s brain will slowly become a storage device and will not actively think. Nevertheless, I still don’t understand the German practice of banning preschool education. I asked German educators to help me understand this issue, and they told me to look for the Basic Law. When I opened the Basic Law (i.e., the Constitution) of the Federal Republic of Germany, I was amazed. Article 7, paragraph 6 of it clearly prohibits the establishment of prerequisite schools (Vorschule). I still didn’t understand why the German constitution stated this, so I had to ask the relevant education experts again. They told me that the “only task” for children before elementary school is to grow up happily. Since the child’s nature is to play, it is important to do things that are in line with the child’s nature and not against the child’s development. If children have to be “educated” before going to school, there are only three aspects of “education”: first, basic social awareness, such as not allowing violence, not talking loudly, etc.; second, children’s hands-on skills, during kindergarten children will be involved in crafts according to their interests. During kindergarten, children will participate in handicrafts according to their own interests, so that they can take the initiative to do specific things from an early age; Third, the development of children’s emotional intelligence, especially leadership. I thought Germany was the only country with such a strange rule. Later, I looked up the situation in the European countries and found that their approach to children is basically the same. Hungary, for example, has legislation that strictly forbids teaching children during kindergarten to learn writing, reading, arithmetic, etc. Kindergarten education is free. Preschool education destroys imagination In contrast to Europe, children in China/Hong Kong have already learned essentially everything they need to know in the first grade of elementary school during kindergarten. There is reason to worry that European children are already losing out to Chinese children at the starting line. In fact, such a fear is superfluous. Europeans generally believe that children have their own growth pattern, and they have to do the corresponding things at the corresponding stage. On the surface, China’s preschool and basic education is very solid, but their imagination and thinking ability has been destroyed, thus causing the child to passively accept knowledge and neglect the habit of active thinking. Put aside the controversy and judgment of the merits of Chinese and Western education, let us focus on the results of German education: since the establishment of the Nobel Prize, the number of Germans (including immigrants to the United States, Canada and other countries of German descent) won the Nobel Prize is nearly half of the total. In other words, 82 million Germans have shared half of the Nobel Prize, while the other 7 billion or so people around the world have received only the remaining half. Is it a matter of race? I’m afraid it’s not that simple. Let’s re-examine the German education and see if their practice is worthy of our learning. I also hope that Chinese educators will not be complacent, because what they are doing today is actually ruining generations of China/Hong Kong.