Michael Swickard
At a friend’s house during a recent afternoon birthday party for her kindergartener, I asked the birthday girl, “How is school?” Kids that age like school.
Surprisingly she said, “I hate school.”
Last summer, she was bubbly about school, but not now. Her mother said, “We are thinking about either home schooling her or sending her to a private school.”
Several other parents joined in. They were also unhappy. One noted, “When I was in kindergarten we had fun every day playing learning games, singing songs, making cookies and taking naps. I liked school.”
“There is no joy in school today,” the parent said. “It is all about the accountability tests, which my daughter does not find interesting. She comes home traumatized by the pressure put on her, which she does not understand.”
A father said his five year old was kept from a field trip because he forgot to bring his homework. “Whoa,” I interjected, “Homework for kindergarteners? There is no best-practices research supporting homework for kids that young.”
The father opined schools are confusing rigor with being inappropriately tough on children. My friend said, “That is right. My daughter’s kindergarten teacher said that if a child does not bring the completed homework back to school every day they will be punished.”
Another parent confirmed, “I heard her say that.” My friend continued, “I told her that the words ‘punish’ and ‘kindergartener’ should never be used in the same sentence.”
I asked, “What happened?”
“She told me I did not understand education. I replied I have a Ph.D. in education from (she named a prestigious university) and do understand educational practice.”
Another parent said when her daughter had chicken pox she stayed home and the next week the school sent a letter saying that she might be charged with a crime by the district attorney for her child missing more than three days of school.
All in all, there were some upset parents.
Naps and snacks
I did not witness any of the above complaints firsthand, but I do believe the remarks. Schools are freaked out about the accountability tests. My concern: kindergarteners are still babies. They need a nap and snacks.
Kids’ formal reasoning does not really starting developing until they are near their seventh birthday. Trying to bolster fourth-grade accountability tests by starting kids preparing for the tests a year earlier ignores all brain research. The kids cannot make progress until their brain development matures, regardless of whether schools want them to do so.
Kindergarten is a relatively new part of New Mexico public schools. In the 1970s the Legislature funded voluntary half-day kindergarten. The selling point was the word “voluntary.” In 1986 the half-day was made mandatory. Six years ago New Mexico moved to mandatory full-day.
Schools adopted a rigorous curriculum aimed at increasing test scores that disallowed fun activities and naps so there is more time to concentrate on academics.
This does not have any research to support it. The countries leading the world in education start their children in school at seven rather than five.
There are five requirements for students to learn:
• They need their curiosity engaged.
• They must develop intellectual tools to satisfy their curiosity.
• While doing so they must enjoy the passage of time. It does not have to be a carnival but if they hate every moment in school there will be no intellectual gain.
• The curriculum must be age-appropriate and must adhere to the guidelines of normal brain development.
• They must always retain their dignity.
The accountability measures, which have completely taken over public education, have no attraction to the curiosity of young students. Learning how to take tests and spending time studying specific content areas that will be on the test holds no attraction to students. They do not enjoy the passage of time doing this kind of work.
And then there is the issue of age-appropriate lessons.
One big fad
With the accountability pressures come the effort by public schools to fundamentally change the nature of public school by moving the curriculum to earlier grades on the apparent assumption that if the students study it longer they will score better when they finally take the tests.
Kindergarteners now study much of the previous curriculum of first grade. Many students find they cannot do these tasks, and so get it into their minds that they can never do the tasks.
The dignity of the students is being compromised when they are tasked to do things that are beyond their age-related cognitive ability. They feel stupid, when in fact the problem is the leaders of the schools who insist they perform brain functions before their brains mature. It is all one big fad.
Public schools have long followed fads not tied to research. They should be required to post the research when fundamentally changing instructional practice like they have with kindergarten.
These kindergarten changes are not supported by research. Worse, kindergarten teachers know this is true, but no one will listen to them. While I aired grievances against some teachers at the start of this column, the No. 1 problem in schools is that teachers are required to be highly qualified but the educational leaders do not pay any attention to them.
For the sake of our children, ask the master kindergarten teachers what to do with these young students – and listen to them for a change.
Swickard is a weekly columnist for this site. You can reach him at michael@swickard.com.
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