However, most of the school day is spent listening to the teacher and sitting quietly in her chair. There isn’t much time to play and interact with other children, and it’s hard to see how another year will help the situation. I am convinced, knowing this little girl, that in an “old school” kindergarten, filled with sand tables, baby dolls, blocks and paint – along with a teacher trained to watch and listen closely, model appropriate behaviors, and practice problem solving, the child would have had a much better year. She would have found ways to express her creative side and practice positive peer interactions. Right now, her peer interactions are strained and seem to be limited to lunch time, standing in line, and other tangential parts of the day…not the focus of the classroom.
What to do? Perhaps I will remind this mom to bring a copy of Alliance for Childhood’s report Crisis in the Kindergarten: Why Children Need to Play in School, when she goes in to talk to the principal. It might not help her daughter, but may help change the experiences of those who come after her.
From page 21 of the report… many experts believe that developmentally inappropriate expectations and practices are causing normal child behavior to be wrongly labeled as misbehavior, and normal learning patterns to be mislabeled as learning disabilities. “This early and inappropriate labeling may have lifelong implications for children who are developing their self-image,” says pediatrician Kenneth R. Ginsburg of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and lead author of the Pediatrics report on play. “Further, labels travel with children and may flavor future teachers’ and even caregivers’ assessments and interactions.”
From page 23… New evidence from research shows that didactic instruction and testing are pushing play out of kindergarten. Kindergartners are now under intense pressure to meet inappropriate expectations, including academic standards that until recently were reserved for first or second grade. These expectations and the policies that result from them have greatly reduced and in some cases obliterated opportunities for imaginative, child-initiated play in kindergarten.
From page 38… Retention in kindergarten has increased even though research indicates that it does not help children and can do serious harm.
Hi As the mother of the spirtited young lady I would also like to add that what free play( besides a 15 minute recess) there is is dictated some what by the teacher. The teacher chooses what center you play at and who you play with at play time. And I am embarassed to just now be really figuring this out in late May. As my daughter expressed…it is not like preschool where Mrs. Blank let you flit around where you want to at playtime.
As a retired teacher and grandmother of a five-year-old, I can see both sides of this issue. Remember, it isn’t the teacher who has determined these standards. They come from above. And there is reasoning in their hope that if children have at least some of the basic knowledge in reading and numbers, they will have a better chance to succeed in school. It’s unfortunate that the system can’t find a way to get this learning to children through play. Of course, it’s more difficult when a teacher has 20-30 little ones to work with.
Parents, however, have a wonderful opportunity to teach their children basic reading and math through play. At playingtoread.com they can get all the help they might need to teach the first steps of reading. I am interested in finding a website that does the same in math. Anyone?