Pushing Children too hard to prepare Kindergarten?

I write this post reflecting on what we have discussed in class about early literacy and having children ready for Kindergarten and having left a PreK parent teacher conference, as a parent, wondering if my son will be ready for Kindergarten. 

After one quarter in PreK five mornings a week, he can only identify 9 letters of his capitals and lower case letters.  At first I was upset, and felt that he needs more direct instruction at home to reinfoce what he is learning in school.  My mother, also an educator, literally laughed at me and said let him be four.   I countered that he won't be ready for Kindergarten.

At some point are we pushing children to develop at a rate they aren't ready to.  My son can tell me that the veins on a leaf are how the leaf gets its food and is excited about it.  He makes connections to the knowledge he has, he decided Hurricane Sandy,was named Sandy, because she messed up all the sand on the beaches. I was told by his teacher he does a wonderful job of connecting their learning to his life experiences, which are plentiful.  He pretends to read books and makes mock shopping lists, and many of the other pre litereacy activities we have learned about in class.

Do I really need to be concerned if he isn't keeping up with the Kindergarten curriculum that is being done in PreK? Are we pushing some children to do things that they just aren't developmentally ready to do?  Is there enough of an emphasis being put on teaching children critical thinking skills as there is on learning their letters?  I really don't know. 

Whose Translating?

Maria shared an insightful article in which a teacher shares her experiences working in ELL students.  One thing in particular that struck a cord with me, was that she suggested it was better to use older siblings to translate when communicating with the parents.  The teacher in the case study actual said it was more effective than using translators provided by the school.  I have always been able to find a way to communicate with parents that did not involved children.  Presently you can even use computer programs to translate what you type to a different language.  I used to use the program, and then take it to the teacher on our staff who spoke Spanish, and she would just make the few corrections, instead of having to translate the whole thing.

One of my student's only involved parent was deaf.  Communicating with her is obviously different than with parents who speak different languages, as I could write notes home and she could write back.  However, whenever I had to meet with her I always set it up with an interpreter.  I can assure it was quite an annoying process to set up a meeting with a translator who works for a school system that spans D.C. and 2 counties in Maryland (who changed her email 3 times during the school year - who does that?).  During one of the meetings when explaining her son's behavior at school, she went into explaining things that were happening in her home with her new boyfriend at the time.  That would not have happened if her brother was serving as the translator. 

From personal experience, my husband's parents do not speak English.  He and his sister were both in Head Start and were ELL students before ELL was a trend.  Teachers often used him as a translator to discuss his sister with his parents.  It would take him less time to just do his sister's work than to explain to his parents and go back and forth with the teacher.  It also meant he had to sit in on less meetings with her teachers and his parents.  This scenerio left her lacking many skills which are learned in school.


These are just two personal examples, but I think we need to be cautious of using the easiest avalaible to translate as opposed what is truely going to benefit the student.  Obviously the resources are not always there, and we all have to make do with what resources we are able to access, but putting older siblings in charge of communicating with the parents of our at risk students does not seem like the best idea.

Lee, S., Butler, M. B., & Tippins, D. J. (2007). A case study of an early childhood teachers perspective on working with english language learners. Multicultural education,

The Technology Effect

Two surveys of teachers about whether technology is hurting attention spans of students were just published.  A large majority of the teachers felt students were easily distracted and unable to research for answers if they do not appear right away when they search.

In my home growing up we did not have Gameboys, Nintendo or any of the other awesome new digital game.  I remember being in the Library and being annoyed that the answer I was looking for was not in the Encyclopedia I had picked.  I am quite certain I did not want to search further, but I had a teacher guiding me to do so.  My lack o Sometimes I think people like to blame someone or something, instead of working to reach the students. 

I think the way students learn has changed, and perhaps it has changed attention spans, but as educators we need to meet our students where they come to us.  If a Kindergarten does not know his letters and his mom lets him play on her smartphone for hours on end, why not suggest apps that allow him to be exposed to his letters more regularly.  In school we can use computer centers to enhance instruction that is being given.  I'm not suggesting that students be watching movies or just play on the computer all day.  However, when we are having trouble reaching students who are used to using technology regularly, we need to embrace that as a way to meet our students needs.  Instead of as the one teacher said, to not lower her standards or the way she teaches. 

The main reason I feel technology should be included in the classroom, even early childhood classrooms, is because we are educating students for the jobs of tomorrow.  Those jobs will likely be full of technology.  To be able to deliver packages for UPS you need to be able to operate handheld electronic devices.  Our current preschool and Kindergarteners will be taking their standardized tests on computers, when are in upper grades, on computers.  I would think that would be motivation alone for teachers to have computer literate students who are able to comprehend what they read from a computer screen.

wrapping it all up: Do our students learn differently than students of the past? absolutely! Did we learn differently than our parents did? yes! It is part of developing as a nation. Our students need to be able to interact with the technology of tomorrow comfortably and effectively.  That means allowing them to explore and learn to be literate in it in our classrooms, while continuing to teach them to be literate in books.

Richtel, M. (2012, November 01). Technology is chaning how students learn, teachers say. The new york times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/01/education/technology-is-changing-how-students-learn-teachers-say.html?ref=education&_r=0

sometimes we all just need to have fun!

When I was looking at Professor Castle's blog, I saw the links for the National Book Festival.  I had promoted this event to my students for five years, as my administration had told me to, but I had never attended.  This year, my son's teacher did such a good job exciting him about going, that we went down to D.C. for it.  It was truely an awesome experience for my preschoolers, my 4 year old actually got things out of it and my 2 year old enjoyed being there.

They weren't sitting there actually reading books at the National Book Festival.  They were doing fun activities related to literacy and exciting my children about literacy.  Throwing bean bags at the letters to spell their name, or watching a Clifford story on a T.V. while the words that are being read are being highlighted,writing their name on a birthday card for Clifford, the list goes on with fun activities they participated in.  I think that early childhood classrooms used to be full of fun engaging activities like this, that there is no tangable result except excitment, excitment about reading.  It is important to take time out of pushing through the standards and just excite our children about learning.
 
One of my students' favorite days in First Grade was when we participated in BookIt's "America's Biggest Bedtime Story."  The students watched a podcast at home of a story being read by a celebrity, we also rewatched it at school in the morning.  They then answered online comprehension questions at school.  The students had uniforms so the principal was uncomfortable having them wear pajamas, but students were able to bring their favorite stuffed animal to school.  In the weeks leading up to this event, the students had selected faculty and staff members to invite to read the class their favorite bedtime story, and in groups wrote them an invitation.  We had the "cool P.E. teacher," the principal, the kindergarten teacher and others join us.  We concluded the day by having the student's seventh grade buddies read them their favorite bed time story and share in hot chocolate and cookies.

Did the students actaully learn a tangable skill?  Unlikely.  But they were excited about reading!  Excited to work on developing their own literacy skills.  Sometimes fun activities to engage our students in the bigger picture are invaluable.

Leveling Out the Achievment Gap

We have been speaking about the difference in the the background knowledge and experiences students have prior to coming to school.  How can schools work to close the achievement gap?  Alli proposed on her blog if PreK becomes mandatory part of all curriculum isn't that just beginning the achievement gap earlier?  However, I propose that we can find examples, of attempting to level out the playing field without pushing the achievement gap earlier.

I student taught in Pennsylvania, where Kindergarten is not required, as I have previously blogged some schools only offer half day Kindergarten.  The particular school district I was in took a unique approach to try and close the achievement gap.  Most of their schools have half day Kindergarten, but some have "extended day" Kindergarten.  These students meet until 2:00pm instead of leaving at in the middle of the day.  If your student does not test proficient at the beginning of the year and you are not at an extended day Kindergarten you can stay for both am and pm Kindergarten.  It is an interesting way to help get all students at minimum at a proficient level.

Another example of trying to level out the playing field is some schools providing PreK, who have a higher level of students at need.  The inner city school district near where I student taught had PreK, just as people in our class teach PreK in Baltimore City schools.  Where as areas with less at risk children do not have PreK in public schools.  The school systems and public need to push to give students who are starting with less exposure to literacy the opportunities they need to be able to achieve.

Our goal is for all our students to have the tools to be able to succeeded in school.

Bi-lingual Elementary Schools

We have spent a significant amount of time in class discussing the importance of various skills in building literacy skills in the English language.  However we haven't talked about how you build literacy skills when working with two different languages.  Learning a second language increases cognitive skills.

Our country often offers students the opportunity to learn second languages in high school, sometimes middle schools.  Rarely you are able to have your child learn a second language at the elementary or preschool level.  In Montgomery county you can enter a lottery to be in an immersion school for a few languages.  However, these are not opportunities available at large.  Perhaps if one of the goals of our education system is to raise global leaders we should look at when second languages are introduced in schools.  On the flip side we have so many students struggling with English, it would be unfair to confuse them by adding another language. 

Our children attend a Greek immersion preschool twice a week in addition to traditional preschool.  I have found that my son who is in his third year of Greek school is excited about learning Spanish from his friends at his traditional school and enjoys teaching them Greek words.  These social learning experiences are occurring because the children are able to expose each other to multiple languages. 

Do you think immersion elementary schools provide students with the benefit of knowing more than one language? or that it puts them at a disadvantage in their native language? I have enjoyed my son having both a traditional and immersion preschool experiences, as it has allowed him to prepare for Kindergarten in English, but given him the opportunity to learn another language. However, I am unsure about putting children in immersion elementary school, where English is the second language they are learning, as opposed to the focus.  I value knowing multiple languages a great deal, as I feel it opens opportunities through out our lives.

The Value of a Kindergarten Teacher

As my son prepares to enter Kindergarten next year, the topic of conversation with many of my friends is often Kindergarten.  I discovered the elementary school down the street from our home is not performing well on test scores.  We had planned to move in a few years, now we wonder if we should move sooner than we anticipated or enroll him in a private school, even though, I have many many people tell me, "It's just Kindergarten."

I would beg to differ with them.  The skills you are learning in Kindergarten are the foundation of future success in life.  Without a solid foundation, you can’t build a wealth of knowledge.  Research did not necessarily support my belief, as students who performed well in early years, often had their edge fade out, according to standardized test scores, by the time students were in junior high.  However, what students are learning in Kindergarten is reflected in more than just their test scores through high school.  Students who learn more in Kindergarten are more likely to go to college, they are more likely to be saving for retirement and most importantly earn more money (Leonhardt, 2010).  In the 1980’s, a study of Kindergarteners, in Tennessee, known as Project Star.  Students were randomly assigned to a kindergarten class, as a result the classes had fairly similar socioeconomic mixes of students and could be expected to perform similarly on an end of the year test.  They did not, some classes did much better than others; the teachers made a huge difference! For the most recent study they revisited the students who had taken part in Project Star to see where they are in life now.

The article suggests that the way to encourage teachers to do a better job would be to pay teachers who do a better job more and fire the worst teachers.  I agree that all teachers should be pushed to do an incredible job for each child they instruct.  In addition legislation about what Kindergarten is and should be needs to be enacted.  In Pennsylvania, where Kindergarten is not legally required, many school districts continue to only offer half day Kindergarten, one school district considered three hours a half day.  I think that the Common Core Standards will help to push a common view of Kindergarten as well provide teachers with a foundation of what needs to be covered during, their year, their 180 days, to impact these adorable little people for the rest of their lives.

 

References

Leonhardt, D. (2010, July 27). The case for $320,000 kindergarten teacher. The new york times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/28/business/economy/28leonhardt.html?_r=1&