Before our walk this morning, Chrysanthemum and I were talking about school. I think I mentioned something about how Susan is so ready for kindergarten (she’ll be six in October) and I hope she won’t be bored since she’ll go in knowing how to read (which was not the case for Sally). Chrysanthemum told me about a conversation she had with the principal at our neighborhood elementary when her son (who is three months older than Susan) was having a rocky transition to kindergarten last fall. Chrysanthemum’s oldest boy is very bright. As in, if I wanted to finish my basement, I could probably get him to be the project manager. But he had never been to preschool, and he is a little stubborn.
The principal said (third-hand) that kindergarten was the hardest grade to teach because the kids come in which such a wide variety of skill levels, not to mention life backgrounds (and I would add innate aptitudes and interests). One kid comes in knowing how to read, another doesn’t know her letters. One kid can estimate a grocery bill, another has spent his early years taking apart small appliances.
This was meant to be comforting, I think, to Chrysanthemum, but it is troubling to me. I loved public school, every year of it, despite needing numerous accomodations that my mother had to fight for sometimes.
But what does this say about the other grades — that all the variety and difference and interest has been boiled down to a state minimum? Even if my kids are below average compared to the standards, what of their likes and desires, their individual outlierliness in pretending?
I know I always get extra-antsy about homeschooling in the spring, which is one of the indicators that summer is on its way (just as a return to public-school-benefits-listing in August is a sign that I have had enough of kids around me every hour), but this is just . . . not right.
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Caveat up front: I am not at all decided about what I will do with my own kids’ schooling. Basically I’m not really attached to or certain about either public schooling or home schooling.
But yes, that’s one of my big concerns with public schooling–especially in my small town with a mediocre school (just one school district, no other charters or other choices) and a good chunk of the population that doesn’t care a whole lot about education. I feel like my kids would be wasting so much precious (play?!) time in class. They certainly won’t be learning and exploring the whole time. Most of it will likely be down time, worksheet time, waiting for the teacher to meet the other kids’ needs time. That one thing that makes me want to look more seriously at home schooling; it would be so much more efficient and more tailored to my kids’ learning styles.
Seth Godin talked about public school and education in general in his new book “Linchpin.” I have to agree, though it makes me sad to say so, that schools are all about test scores and rote memorization and pretty much standardizing every child (for the most part–there are exceptions of course). If I had the desire and the patience to home school I would probably do it, but unfortunately I don’t. All I do is remind myself I turned out okay even though I went to a mediocre junior high and high school. College gave me the opportunity to better explore my interests, though even then it wasn’t nearly enough time! I’m still figuring out what I’d like to be when I grow up!
Jane Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 11:18 am
What Seth said about public school in his talk for Startup Princess I thought was so fascinating, and I was convinced! (Although not quite enough to take on the overwhelming task of having all my kids home ALL DAY LONG ;p)
Really it is because kids develop so differently. At 12 months you have kids who walk, or don’t walk. Kids who talk, or don’t talk. Kids who have spent the last 12 months learning what their brains felt like learning . ALL KIDS will eventually (barring disability of course) learn to walk and learn to talk.
So that is why kindergarten is different, just because they are younger and so their learning has been somewhat based on what they DEVELOPMENTALLY were ready to do. Some four year olds were ready to learn to read, some weren’t interested in letters yet. Some have excellent fine motor skills, others have more advance gross motor skills. But they have all learned to talk, all learned to walk. By 1st grade they can all use scissors. Does it really matter if they learned to use scissors at age 3 or age 5? No. So we don’t push them to learn it at age 3. We let them development.
At a certain point, however, all children CAN learn to read, so we make sure all children can read. The math skills of two year olds are quite vast. But even if a kid shows no interest in premath skills at age two, they are likely ready to learn 1st grade math when in first grade.
I hope I explained myself.
The fact that things “level out by 3rd grade” isn’t at all about school killing our children’s individuality. It is accepting that while each child’s first years are varied in how their brain develops, you don’t need to overly worry over “skills” in very young children. You let them take the path that their brain has. Eventually, all children can learn to read and we want them all to read and add and write and everything.
So these are my thoughts. Coming from a mom with gifted kids and kids with learning disabilities. I find it fascinating to watch them learn. My almost two year old is so interested in letters it is cute, but he can’t talk much. I am “forcing” the talking with speech therapy and language development therapy (thanks to what I learned with older son). I have to strike a balance between the intentional learning and the letting it happen naturally. Ultimately, though, the best language learning is child interest led so it is all about setting up an environment for him to be naturally motivated to try to communicate.
But you can’t make him learn something until he is ready. It is fun to “work” on things that aren’t hard for him. I remember having to work on not making everything about my older son’s language deficit. So I had to “work” on his strengths too, just to balance it out.
Anyway, the other thing is that gifted programs shouldn’t start until 3rd grade because late bloomers might actually be gifted. My daughter was in kindergarten and she didn’t reach the level of a kid who was in her class. He went on to gifted in 1st grade. After two years of misery, he dropped out of the gifted program. My daughter went on to lear and grow and by 4th grade her teacher begged me to have her tested. She is now in a gifted program and thriving. So while I suspect my younger daughter similar, I am going to wait to test her. Wait and see what kind of student she actually is. It is to small of a reference to think an early reader is “gifted” and a late reader isn’t as “school smart.”
continued
Lest I sound too conceited or something, but also because it is on the subject..I have to say I have many reservations about IQ tests. I had one child test under 70 at age 3. One child test 98th percentile at age 11. Hmmmm. You have to guess that I disbelieve the age 3 test, so I refused to let him be tested again (IQ) at age 6. You just can’t get an accurate IQ test at so young an age. You can only test a slice and it just depends on so many different factors. My other child who has been tested tested at 89th percentile at age 10 and then jumped up to 98th the following year. So it just shows that cognitive tests can only show you a glimpse and they aren’t a complete picture. But definitely the younger they are the less accurate the test is, that is a proven fact not just anectdotal.
Jane Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 11:16 am
Thanks for your thoughts. I took an IQ test at 8 so I could skip third grade, and when I found the results several years later, it was interesting how right the navy psychologist seemed to be about me. (But sometimes I wish I had never found that piece of paper ;p).
I responded to your other points under Charlotte’s comment (since hers was the last one in a series agreeing with you and I didn’t want to repeat myself ;p).
I’m with jks here. What makes you think kids are all the same at other grade levels? That’s why they have gifted programs, extra help for learning, etc. They break the class into groups for reading, math, etc. according to ability. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having standards and trying to make sure all kids meet them.
For me, living in a pretty good school district, I am planning to send my kids to public school, and if they need additional help, either because they struggle, or because the standards are too easy for them, I will supplement at home. Although I’ve seen really good things about our school district providing both of those.
I don’t want to take on all the responsibility of home schooling. Nor do I want to give all the responsibility to the school.
Jane Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 11:16 am
Um, that’s just what I inferred from the principal’s statement, not my own feeling at all.
I responded to your other points under Charlotte’s comment (since hers was the last one in a series agreeing with you and I didn’t want to repeat myself ;p).
Hmmm, I’m mostly with jks on this. But I’d like to add that as mothers it is important that we supplement their education and help them learn and grow in ways that fit their needs and interests. It’s the children that have parents that don’t care that will struggle most. And that is definitely not your kids. And yes, sometimes it may mean homeschooling if that is what you feel your kids need. The beauty is that you know them, you can pray about what they need and make those decisions. Isn’t it glorious to be a mother?
I agree with both jks and Tara. Here is how I see it- adding the “innate aptitudes and interests” is what makes your argument fall apart. Kids enter kindergarten at different levels completely independent of their innate abilities. There is a difference between how to teach a child who doesn’t know his letters because he struggles and one who doesn’t know them because he has yet to learn them. In kindergarten a teacher has no way of knowing why some kids are advanced (natural ability or force fed preschool from the time they were 2?) and some behind (failed to learn it or failed to be introduced to it?) and so it is hard to judge what the kids need.
By 1st grade it is easier to know and by 3rd grade it is more apparent which kids need special education because of learning struggles or academic aptitude.
In fact, once I figured this out I completely stopped formal preschool with the kiddos. It is like potty training- take 500 hours before they’re ready or wait and let them get it almost immediately once they are ready. (Unless there are obvious developmental delays which mean children need to be worked with to keep them at level or they’ll be too far behind when school starts.)
I have had my kids in school in 3 states, 4 districts, and 6 schools and have yet see this “creativity squashing, droid creating” activity. My kids have always had smaller reading groups and math groups in the classroom with kids at their level. Some of them (the oldest 3 who are past 3rd grade) receive particular attention where they leave the classroom to receive gifted education. In all three places. And even if they didn’t, they still get it at home.
I have spent a lot of time examining what would be the best education for my children and I have them in public school because I think that is the best option in most situations. I think homeschooling is a good option for the exceptions (in child or school or teacher) and I never judge others decision to home school because it is not my place to judge who is an exception. Home school is a valid way to educate children. I take it back, there is one person I know who I think shouldn’t be homeschooling her children, but that is due to unhealthy relationships between kid and mother and I still don’t go around telling her I think so.
Jane Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 11:14 am
I didn’t really think I was making an argument. It was the principal who said that kindergarten was the hardest because of differing skill levels, and I just inferred that to mean that skill levels are much more homogeneous in the other grades. My only input is that this seems like a wrong thing to me, and despite agreeing mostly with what jks and Tara and you say about kids’ abilities leveling off (homogenizing) somewhat at around the 3rd grade or so, I still think this is a negative aspect of public (or really any group schooling) — or rather, of any school that does not try to accomodate as many different levels in one class as possible.
This is kind of like Montessori, right? Where they have multiple grade levels (much less same-grade different skill-level) in the same class room? (So I mean, what I gathered from the principal’s statement — my inference that other grades are “easier” to teach bec. the kids have homogenized (been homogenized?) is actually the opposite of the Montessori philosophy?) (Not that I know that much about Montessori, I admit.)
If skill level has homogenized naturally enough to account for the principal’s relative ease of teaching the other grades, then fine, but I am suspicious of how much of this is natural and how much is due to the schooling system and to the teachers (naturally, who can blame them?) seeking an “easier” way of teaching.
And maybe I am just still bitter about not making the lottery into our charter school. What with grandfathering and such, there are about 5 new seats every year.
And you all are absolutely right, with an advocate parent, almost any school system can be made to work for your child. That was certainly my experience with my mom.
Charlotte Reply:
March 12th, 2010 at 9:23 pm
I was just saying the inference you made wasn’t the way I took what he said (although granted it is now 4th person so I can only guess from what I’ve observed in my own situations). It is the differing levels that have nothing to do with natural aptitude that makes kindergarten teaching hard. My kids didn’t have preschool so they entered kindergarten on the low end of skill spectrum, but by half way they were near the top. After that first year the kids’ progress is more closely in line with their aptitude and so it is easier to group them with like-skilled peers.
I guess I was trying to say from what I’ve seen in my own children’s classrooms is the kids aren’t more homogenized as they move through the school system, it is just easier to group them with peers with similar aptitudes and once grouped, easier to teach. For instance- my 6th grader takes the most difficult 7th grade math course with other 6th grade math whizzes and my 7th grader is grouped (they split the grades into 4 teams in middle school) with the “smart” kids and they are taught by the 8th grade set of teachers all day.
I am bitter because the only charter school offered here is “multicultural” focused and actually says in their flier they place multicultural education above academics. So I can’t even get a nice half public/half private option to get wait listed.
If I still don’t make sense, blame it on my evil “let’s prepare for daylight savings by moving our wake up time a little earlier each day” that has left me half asleep by 10:00 at night.
Homeschooling is not immune to this either. I encountered that very problem at the co-op last Friday. During music class, I watched as the teacher went around the table asking every child to define quarter notes, half notes, etc. Every child except Jessamine. Over and over. After the class I pulled her aside and told her that yes Jessamine is a tiny little girl, but she is actually very smart for her age, and is in fact doing a first grade curriculum at the age of four. She understands everything the teacher is saying. But because she wasn’t being involved in the class, she stopped paying attention and started messing around. I only knew this because I sit in on every class. If I hadn’t been there to intervene, she would have been completely left behind without my even knowing.
If the school is larger than a single classroom per grade, then part of the grades beyond kindergarten becoming easier to teach (from the principal’s viewpoint) may partly be due to the fact that the school has an additional 2 years to shuffle the kids into like-ability groups within their grades, bringing each room of 3rd graders closer to homogeneous groupings, and thus easier for their respective teachers to teach to one level at a time.
school is like a job. you go there to do what is required of you. if you are truly intelligent you learn how to adapt an survive and enjoy school. it is not your teacher’s job to encourage all the kids in their 26 different kinds of creativity.
you can still be creative or whatever at home. that’s the mom’s and dad’s job to encourage and provide such an environment. if you turn off the media at home your child will have plenty of time to grow their minds in different ways. school grows a child’s brain in one way and that’s ok. we as parents can do the rest.
my older children went to school reading. and if they are ever bored i make sure they always have a fresh and exciting book in their backpack. if they get done sooner, they just read. or they just play. either way they are having fun.