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

[Pickrell, Rebecca M (TASC)]

        I had a preschool director tell me (and it's important to remember her perspective) that the stakes are lower in preschool which is why it's important kids go. She says that if a six year old bops someone over the head while he's figuring out how to share, it's far more serious then if a three year old does it.  I found this interesting.
I think part of the push for preschool is that families are smaller now. Kids do need to learn things that they used to have learned from older siblings and other big kids in their lives.

I also think that kids are able to do school type stuff earlier because we've gotten rid of many childhood and big people illnesses. The energy that used to be spent getting sick, being sick, then recovering can now be used for other things.

As for our educational system compared to the rest of the world, I'd be careful with that. We only know what other countries want us to know.  The U.S. is very good at giving the rest of the world a clear view. Other countries, well not so much. Look at some of the Indian engineers who can do exactly what they are told, but who cannot think creatively.  I'll see if I can find an article I recently read and post to the list.

Also, India uses far more manual labor then the U.S. so not everybody is bennifitting from what we think of as a better education.

What I've always found interesting is that no matter when and where an earthquake happens, there are a large number of children not at home with their families.  Look at this next time an earthquake hits the news. No matter what time it is local time, you'll find a surprisingly large number of children not with mom and dad.
Where I do think America fails is that the vocational tech programs are where they send the "bad kids".  This to me is very wrong because it sends the message that these professions aren't valuable.  It also means you have to do poorly in school to be considered for HVAC, automechanic or plumbing training.



-----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 11:19 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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