[blparent] First Grade, Kindergarten, Pre-K, Preschool ...

Mon Aug 20 04:31:35 UTC 2012

And I do not have an issue with one per year, to kind of gauge the kid and
the system, but my child has been in 1st grade three days, and has already
taken some standardized tests.
 I think there are at least two different tests they take here, and they do
them 2-3 times a year.
The funny part, is they do not even agree on my kids abilities.
So out of the school year, they have a couple to 4 weeks devoted to nothing
but tests. Um...geeze, what can you be teaching my kid in that time.

Michael

-----Original Message-----
From: blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Jo Elizabeth Pinto
Sent: Sunday, August 19, 2012 11:21 PM
To: Blind Parents Mailing List
Subject: Re: [blparent] First Grade, Kindergarten, Pre-K, Preschool ...

I was on the committee that helped write the standardized tests in Colorado
as they applied to blind children, and I have proofread the tests from many
states.  I think the whole idea of standardized testing is flawed because we
don't have standardized children.  They all have different aptitudes,
different learning styles, different attention spans.  But I suppose the
rush for early education could have to do with the incessant comparing that
parents do, or the worrying about comparisons made by other parents.

Jo Elizabeth

I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's
brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and
died in cotton fields and sweatshops.--Stephen Jay Gould -----Original
Message-----
From: Michael Baldwin
Sent: Sunday, August 19, 2012 9:46 PM
To: 'Blind Parents Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [blparent] First Grade, Kindergarten, Pre-K, Preschool ...

Yikes, such a loaded question, or questions. This could get to be a very
ugly discussion.
My take on the older kids and our education not doing so hot is that it
seems kids are told what to think, not how to think.
The younger kids, well I think it is my kid has to keep up with the Jones,
and be better then the Jones. Humans are competitive by nature, "only the
strong will survive", and if my kid is not doing better then the Jones' kid,
then my kid won't get a job, won't have a good life etc. This has been going
on for a while, it didn't just happen over night. Now there is so much
standardized testing done in schools, if kids are above their grade level
when they start, then it looks better for the school. To bad most kids even
off, and even drop below, now it is easier to get on IEP's then it use to
be, so more kids are in sped classes.
The younger kids do learn faster in general, so if you can get them to learn
the basics right away, it is suppose to help.\ But I think schools are
trying to be a machine that pumps out exact copies of cookies each and every
time. Kids aren't the same, and it seems the smart kids get dumbed down to
be level with the middle kids, and the not so smart kids get 75% of the
attention to get them up to the middle. Unfortunately kids aren't going to
all learn the same stuff at the same rate, or even want to learn it. There
are more programs focused on the kids that are not doing so well than there
are for those that are doing extremely well.
The big push around here is reading, almost exclusive to anything else, at
the end of last year, the administration finally announced that their scores
in math have dropped. Duh, no kidding, I guess I didn't go to school to be a
teacher, so the fact I pointed that out way before the scores showed it
meant nothing. Oh, and their solution, yep, more reading. If they can read
they can figure anything out, UG>>> If my kid's teacher can not tell me how
my kid is doing with out some stupid standardized test that costs the school
district who knows how much, that lines the pocket of the private
corporations that make up the tests, then they should not be a teacher.
Yeah, I'll stop here before I get going to much more. My wife is a teacher,
and her and I get in to heated discussions about the public education system
a lot.

Michael

-----Original Message-----
From: blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Jo Elizabeth Pinto
Sent: Sunday, August 19, 2012 10:19 PM
To: NFBnet Blind Parents Mailing List
Subject: [blparent] First Grade, Kindergarten, Pre-K, Preschool ...

My daughter started preschool a year ago; now she's in Pre-K. She goes two
days a week and really enjoys her class activities. But I'm wondering about
the trend of getting kids started earlier and earlier. When kindergarten
came about, it was to prepare kids for the first grade. It was a half day a
week, just sort of easing the kids into school and teaching them how to be
students--share, cooperate, follow directions, the basics. Kindergarten
isn't even mandatory in all states, but now there are year-long waiting
lists to get kids into full-day kindergarten classes. And we have Pre-K
programs at our preschools. And preschool is promoted to get kids ready for
Pre-K, which will prepare them for kindergarten, which was meant to prepare
them for first grade. The insinuation is that if your child doesn't have
Pre-K, she'll not be on track for kindergarten, and if she doesn't do
preschool, she won't measure up well in Pre-K. So when and why did
everything get so competetive? When and why did we stop letting our kids be
kids till they started school? What are we pushing them toward, and is it
good for them in the long run?

As part of her Pre-K information, I was given a list of standards that most
kindergartens hope their students will be on track with before they start.
They need to know all of their letters and numbers, as well as recognizing
some common words by sight.  They need to know how to count to twenty and
remember all the tens up to one hundred.  They need to know their colors and
shapes by sight, and be able draw the shapes with a pencil.  They need to
have basic skills with crayons, scissors, and glue.  It's preferred if they
can write their first and last names.  That sounds like first grade used to
be.  I believe I remember learning my letters and numbers in kindergarten.

I just worry that our society has become too competetive with young
children.  Besides that, if the standards are so strict for incoming
kindergartners, then what are they teaching in kindergarten, and why isn't
the quality of our education system, particularly in America, rising when
compared to that of students elsewhere in the world?

Jo Elizabeth

I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's
brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and
died in cotton fields and sweatshops.--Stephen Jay Gould
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