Pre-K

Good preschool teachers don't give children the answers; they help children get there on their own by "stretching children's thinking."

So says Robert Pianta, Dean of the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia and a recognized expert in early education, in a new video on effective classroom interactions that interweaves advice and policy discussion with clips of teachers talking and singing with their students. The video, which offers a helpful engaging overview of the latest thinking on early education, is designed in part to promote more use of the Classroom Assessment Scoring System, or the CLASS, a tool for measuring what happens in minute-by-minute increments between teachers and students. As explained in a new policy brief by Pianta and colleagues, the system has been used in more than 2,000 classrooms to assess teaching quality. (Work on CLASS is funded in part by the Foundation for Child Development, which is among Early Ed Watch's funders as well.)

Over at the Quick & the Ed, Chad Aldeman does a great job of unpacking some of the reasons why it's incredibly difficult for college students who begin their education at community colleges to successfully transfer to 4-year institutions and earn a bachelor's degree (a model known as "2+2," because successful students would, in theory, spend two years in a community college, plus two more in a 4-year institution). In fact, shockingly few students who enroll at community colleges with the intention to earn a BA ever do so. This is a problem on a whole bunch of levels. But it's particularly likely to become an issue as states and now the federal Head Start program seek to increase the number of pre-k and early education teachers who have bachelor's degrees.

For many current pre-k and Head Start teachers who will seek to earn bachelor's degrees in order to meet new requirements, local community colleges are the logical place to start on their path to a BA. Community colleges are cheaper and more convenient than four-year institutions, and they're often much more targeted to the needs of older adults returning to college. Moreover, many community colleges already have relatively strong associate's degree programs for early childhood educators.

Last week by the National Research Council released an extensive report which argues that children need more math instruction in early childhood than they are getting now - much more. Why? Because children are not only ready to learn but are in fact learning math long before they enter a preschool classroom.

Research shows that even in infancy children develop an implicit understanding of basic mathematical concepts, such as shapes and spatial relationships. The NRC report details the "foundational and achievable" math content that can and should be taught to children in the early years to support and nurture what children are already learning from the world around them. Teachers can help by focusing and building upon this spontaneous learning.

Today our younger neighbors to the north will be celebrating their nation's birthday with parades and fireworks and maple-leaf flags. This year, kids in Ontario have something else to celebrate: the province is embarking on an ambitious strategy to expand early education access and better align child care, pre-k and elementary programs.

With Our Best Future in Mind, a new report commissioned by Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and written by Early Learning Advisor Dr. Charles Pascal, maps out a major reorganization and expansion of early education services in the province. The report calls for expansion of full-day junior kindergarten (pre-k) and senior kindergarten classes (most are currently half-day programs). It also calls for Ontario to integrate day care for children up to age 4 , junior and senior kindergarten, and primary education from grades 1 through 6 in order to create a "continuum of services for children from birth to age 12." It encourages early educators to develop a "common programming framework for all of Ontario's early childhood settings," so that children experience similar curriculum and quality standards regardless of where they are served. And it recommends expanded parental leave, quality child care, support programs for the youngest children, and optional extended day programs for school-age children. Most of these programs could go into effect as soon as 2010, but with a longer timeline for expanding parental leave: the move would require significant changes in legislation, which Pascal expects by 2020.

If you read an article about an audit of Georgia's pre-k program in the Atlanta Journal Constitution over the weekend, you probably thought you were reading bad news. According to the article, a recent state audit found that "the state has spent more than $216 million on a program to help low-income children get kindergarten-ready, without any concrete proof it's working." But the news is not as bad as it may sound.

The program in question is not the Georgia pre-k program, Bright from the Start, but a part of that program, the Resource Coordination (RC) Program, which provides grants to pre-k providers to provide enhanced services such as home visits and parent counseling. Pre-k directors are already responsible for the provision of these services, but the grant helps 227 programs across the state employ 484 dedicated resource coordinators to enhance these services in communities with greater need. Granted, the AJC article pointed out this distinction but did not mention that the $18.5 million spent on the RC program represents only 5.7 percent of the state's total pre-k expenditures.

In 2007, a group of community organizers in Chicago surveyed several low-income neighborhoods and discovered some disturbing news: Between 40 and 64 percent of preschool-aged children in those areas were not enrolled in the state's preschool program or Head Start -- even though both are free to at-risk children.

"Why Isn't Johnny In Preschool?" is a new report that both reveals what has stymied pre-k attendance among children with the greatest need for it and offers a series of recommendations for how to increase enrollment. It was published this spring by the early learning committee of a group called POWER-PAC, a Chicago organization of low-income parents who advocate for new ways to help families. Recommendations derive from more than 5,000 interviews conducted from 2006 to 2008 in low-income neighborhoods with predominantly Latino or African American populations.

On Friday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry vetoed legislation, passed by the state legislature, to enhance pre-k standards in the state. Gov. Perry also signed a two-year, $182 million state budget that included $25 million in new funding to support the enhanced pre-k program. Although Perry's veto means the program will not be established, the money will remain in the budget, and will be allocated to the existing state pre-k program.

Play through learning. Play = Learning. Play is learning. These are the variations of the play mantra that was repeated by researchers and early childhood educators last week at the annual professional development institute held by the National Association for the Education of Young Children. 

More than 2,000 people attended the institute, which was held in Charlotte, N.C. Several of the presentations are now available online in a searchable directory on the NAEYC web site, which, by the way, received a major face lift last week to make it easier to navigate. Here are a few of the sessions that caught our eye (they cannot be directly hyperlinked but you can get to them by searching by author's name):

Yesterday, the federal government provided details about how and when states should apply for a chunk of $100 million in stimulus funds for "state advisory councils." These councils -- which are supposed to coordinate the growing tangle of early childhood programs at the state, local and federal level -- have been mandated by law since 2007 but have often languished for lack of  funding. It's not even clear how many actually exist.

The new guidance, which calls for proposals for three-year projects, was published on the Web by the Administration for Children & Families, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (It's also available as a 10-page PDF document.)

Sophia Pappas isn't above taking imaginary phone calls from Spongebob to keep her students engaged. These and other playful tactics are woven into the stories Pappas tells in Good Morning, Children, a memoir about her experience teaching pre-kindergarten as a Teach For America corps member. The first half of the book describes her anxieties about teaching pre-K and the ultimate success she finds in her classroom at Carter Elementary in the Newark Public Schools. The second half includes specific anecdotes and musings on her teaching philosophy derived from her blog for Pre-K Now, a non-profit organization that advocates for universal pre-K programs.

The book's amusing anecdotes keep the reader interested, while Pappas' careful description of best practices gives the book some real substance. Many chapter headings summarize the lessons Pappas teaches her students: "Making Peace," Saying Goodbye," "Taking Charge," and "Coping with the Bad Days," to name a few. Other chapters include recommendations for teachers, but without the prescriptive tone present in other "how to" manuals.