NANCY BAILEY: Kindergarten Learning Loss Message Is HORRIFYING for Children!

Kindergarten Learning Loss Message Is HORRIFYING for Children!

Kindergarten Learning Loss Message Is HORRIFYING for Children!

No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, high-stakes testing, Common Core, and other bad school reform measures are coming together with Covid-19 to destroy the futures of America’s youngest learners!

They include the same equity and disparity talk used to ramp up the above harmful policies. Those changes to schools, all that rigor talk, did not work before, and they’ll not work to fix pandemic losses.

What child is going to welcome learning, look forward to going to school, some for the first time, when they hear about how far behind they’ve already fallen?

When parents read dire reports they will feel compelled to push their kindergartners and early learners harder. They’ll worry about the next test. Children will see learning as something to fear not a joyful experience.

Last November we saw Dallas Students Suffer ‘Horrifying’ Learning Loss During Pandemic, New Data Suggests. Such hyperbole is harmful.

Dallas doesn’t stop with the November report. Now we learn Dallas Trustees  CONTINUE READING: Kindergarten Learning Loss Message Is HORRIFYING for Children!

CURMUDGUCATION: FL: Let's Assess Four Year Olds

CURMUDGUCATION: FL: Let's Assess Four Year Olds

FL: Let's Assess Four Year Olds

We have been down this road before, but I will beat this drum till my knuckles bleed (and the older my children and my grandchildren get, the harder I'll drum). 

Florida is once again reporting that 40% of Florida kindergartners are "not ready for kindergarten." Rep. Erin Grall (R) told a House early learning subcommittee "That's on us," as part of her pitch for HB 419, a bill intended to restructure Florida's early learning "system."

Florida has been spent a few years giving five year olds their own version of the Big Standardized Test to measure kindergarten readiness, and it has consistently found that nearly half of Florida's littles "are not ready" for kindergarten.

Clearly there is a problem, and the Florida legislature has been steadfast about looking for that problem in the wrong place.

If half of your five year olds are "not ready" for kindergarten, the problem is with either A) your instrument for measuring readiness and/or B) your expectations for what "readiness" looks like.

I bolded that because all caps would just be rude. But nobody in power in Florida seems to be looking at this answer.

There's the Children's Movement of Florida that wants to get to 10% kindergarten readiness by 2030. The group is a real cross-section of Florida's education policy-makers. Founded by David Lawrence, a CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: FL: Let's Assess Four Year Olds

NANCY BAILEY: Amplify and iReady Claim Kindergarten and First Grade “Reading Loss” to Profit From the Pandemic

Amplify and iReady Claim Kindergarten and First Grade “Reading Loss” to Profit From the Pandemic

Amplify and iReady Claim Kindergarten and First Grade “Reading Loss” to Profit From the Pandemic

Are kindergartners falling behind in reading due to the pandemic? Amplify and iReady want us to think so.

But kindergarten teachers should not be forcing children to learn to read during the pandemic. They shouldn’t have been pushing them to read before Covid-19. Nor should kindergartners be forced to read after the coronavirus becomes a bad memory.

Children always used to begin formal reading instruction during first grade. Expecting kindergartners to read by the time they get to first grade is bizarre. Still, by making children look like they’re falling behind, companies can make money on reading remediation and tutorial programs. During the pandemic it’s called the covid slide. 

Education Week promotes this wrong message in Students’ reading losses could strain schools’ capacity to help them catch up. They say Amplify and iReady claim children fall behind in reading because they are entering first grade not knowing how to read.

It’s going to cost billions, according to iReady, to remediate these so-called reading CONTINUE READING: Amplify and iReady Claim Kindergarten and First Grade “Reading Loss” to Profit From the Pandemic

Fewer Kindergartners Could Signal Big Educational, Financial Troubles For Sacramento City Schools - capradio.org

Fewer Kindergartners Could Signal Big Educational, Financial Troubles For Sacramento City Schools - capradio.org

Fewer Kindergartners Could Signal Big Educational, Financial Troubles For Sacramento City Schools

Ann Crisp says her family tried doing “Zoom-school” for their 5-year-old son Lennon earlier this year, but it just didn’t work.

She works at home because of the COVID-19 pandemic, so she set her son up in front of a computer next to her desk to make sure he paid attention during class. But her son has minor speech and motor skill delays, and it was frustrating for him to sit through three 45-minute online sessions, she says.  

“Because of his delays, even following along doing the alphabets, I needed to be there, right next to him, helping him hold his pencil the right way,” Crisp explained. “It seemed just too much for him.”

Now, Crisp pays about $1,100 a month to keep her would-be kindergartner in a private preschool this year.

Her family is part of a pandemic-era trend that Sacramento and many other school districts are experiencing this year: a massive drop in kindergarten enrollment. 

Early data show Sacramento City Unified School District has about 600 fewer kindergartners this year, and about 1,600 fewer kids overall.

Child advocates and school officials fear the enrollment drop and educational disruptions for the young children could widen existing racial achievement gaps, and endanger school financing in the future.

“We’re very concerned about the effects on our district if we continue to see this level of CONTINUE READING: Fewer Kindergartners Could Signal Big Educational, Financial Troubles For Sacramento City Schools - capradio.org

NANCY BAILEY: Kindergarten Pandemic Learning Fears Should Not Be Tied to Screen Time and Rigid Drilling

Kindergarten Pandemic Learning Fears Should Not Be Tied to Screen Time and Rigid Drilling

Kindergarten Pandemic Learning Fears Should Not Be Tied to Screen Time and Rigid Drilling

Kindergartners and their parents and teachers struggle with the pandemic. When the focus is on problems with children learning online, whether a child will succeed, it might help to revisit what’s developmentally appropriate for a kindergartner.

Many reports are raising concern about learning loss in kindergarten. “What Kindergarten Struggles Could Mean for a Child’s Later Years” is an example. It tells of the concern parents and teachers have with young children mastering online instruction and learning.

Reporters, parents, and teachers need to avoid ginning up anxiety about children learning in kindergarten. Kindergarten used to be about play and socializing. Pushing children to retain information too early, drilled online, could make a child feel they’re slow, or like there’s something wrong, and they might not like learning.

During this strange time, children miss out on socializing and playing together, but fretting about learning loss is overdone, and these articles often lean towards pushing young children back into the classroom when it might not be safe. It could help to reconsider kindergarten expectations.

Before 1983, the Princeton Center for Infancy and Early Childhood questioned the CONTINUE READING: Kindergarten Pandemic Learning Fears Should Not Be Tied to Screen Time and Rigid Drilling

Where are all the kindergartners? Pandemic creates rare gap year

Where are all the kindergartners? Pandemic creates rare gap year

Where are all the kindergartners? Pandemic creates rare gap year

While K-12 enrollment has gradually decreased in recent years, the latest kindergarten numbers are abnormally low.

SACRAMENTO — Amy Neier carefully wrote “first day of kindergarten” on a whiteboard and posed her 5-year-old son Hunter with the sign to capture the milestone she had long waited for.

Then Hunter headed off for another year of preschool instead.

Neier and parents across the nation are skipping kindergarten in droves during the most tumultuous school year in generations. Frustrated by the thought of sticking their 5-year-olds in front of screens during the pivotal first year of school, they are sending their children to extended preschool, forming learning pods or foregoing formal instruction altogether.

“I thought my tears would be because I was sending my baby to school, not because I was worrying if the decision to keep him out of school this year was the wrong one," said Neier, who lives in Peoria, Ariz.

Given the choice, parents have sought alternatives, especially essential workers who need child care to stay employed. Teachers are doing their best to keep their students' attention — but also would prefer to return to their classrooms whenever conditions are safe. School administrators are imploring families to enroll their kindergartners, fearing a loss of attendance-based dollars.

And while affluent families can still find ways to give their 5-year-olds enrichment activities, low-income children may be losing out on a full year of instruction they would have received otherwise.

“Some parents are leaving their kids in their current pre-K or child care programs but a lot of parents don’t have that option, so where are these kids?” said Patricia Lozano, executive director of Early Edge California. “Kindergarten is not CONTINUE READING: Where are all the kindergartners? Pandemic creates rare gap year

Where Have All the Children Gone? - LA Progressive

Where Have All the Children Gone? - LA Progressive

Where Have All the Children Gone?

COVID-era Kindergarten Enrollment Drop Raises Deep Concerns

Newly released figures from the Los Angeles Unified School District – one of the nation’s largest – show that roughly 6,000 fewer students registered for kindergarten this school year than in the previous year – a roughly 14% decrease from last year’s number of 42,912 children. 

At a recent public address, Superintendent Austin Beutner said the biggest declines came from the most impoverished neighborhoods, where economic hardship resulting from the pandemic is most acute.

“We suspect some of this is because families may lack the ability to provide full-time support at home for online learning, which is necessary for very young learners,” Beutner said. “This is yet another reminder that this crisis is having a disproportionate impact on low-income families.”

Formal education isn’t legally required for California children younger than age 6, but experts have long said that high-quality preschool and kindergarten programs can narrow racial and economic achievement gaps among students. That’s why this year’s kindergarten decline could roll back the academic progress of vulnerable students – low-income youth, English language learners, children in foster care or from communities ofc olor. 

Children who sit out kindergarten may not only suffer academically but also socially, entering first grade without basic skills. 

And as the spread of coronavirus leads to unprecedented job, housing and food insecurity, Beutner expects volatility in enrollment to continue for the foreseeable future.

“Since the crisis began, schools have had to balance three, sometimes–conflicting, priorities: the learning needs of students, the needs of working families and the health and safety of all in the school community,” he said during his Aug. 31 update to the LAUSD community.

Los Angeles Unified schools ended in-person instruction on March 13, but with COVID-19 cases dropping and CONTINUE READING: Where Have All the Children Gone? - LA Progressive

NANCY BAILEY: Kindergarten Reading Push: Still Problematic During the Pandemic

Kindergarten Reading Push: Still Problematic During the Pandemic

Kindergarten Reading Push: Still Problematic During the Pandemic

Parents and educators, convinced that kindergartners must learn to read, might purchase unproven commercial online reading programs during the pandemic. The best solution for kindergartners currently is for school librarians and teachers to get interesting picture books and reading material into the hands of young children.

Standardized testing made pushing children to read in kindergarten part of the curriculum. No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and Common Core State Standards contributed to remaking kindergarten. Now this harmful practice is interwoven into the kindergarten curriculum.

During a pandemic, it would seem like these harsh kindergarten requirements could be dropped. Instead, mandatory reading goals still highlight kindergarten.

A report by Christina A. Samuels in Education Week “Will Kindergartens Be Empty this Fall?” illustrates the problem. The report describes difficulties school CONTINUE READING: Kindergarten Reading Push: Still Problematic During the Pandemic