Re: [xmca] Kndergarten Cram: When is play?

["zdravo" <zdravo@eunet.yu>]

David,
I just wish to let you know that I highly appreciate your very simple and
clear sentence: a kindergarten without play is like a university without
library. It reflects the way of building public preschool education for
years, here in Serbia (republic of  ex/Yugoslavia).
Best regards from Belgrade
Vesna


----- Original Message -----
From: "David Preiss" <davidpreiss@uc.cl>
To: <mcole@weber.ucsd.edu>; "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity"
<xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
Sent: Monday, May 04, 2009 6:30 PM
Subject: Re: [xmca] Kndergarten Cram: When is play?


>
> No CLBH in Chile, but same miseries at the kindergarten. A
> kindergarten without play is like a university without library. But
> many many practitioners have forgotten so. At least in Chile, it is
> VERY difficult to find a good preschool that takes play seriously. The
> eradication of play from preschools seem to be part of a larger
> worldwide trend to standardization, over-achievement and loss of
> educational common sense. The ending extreme of this new educational
> training seems to be neuroenhancing at the college level:
>
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/04/27/090427fa_fact_talbot?currentPa
ge=all
>
> No wonder why we get a Flynn effect everywhere, but I really wonder
> how good is that for those kids who are receiving a training that is
> based on skill drilling instead of cultural transmission.
>
> Time to re-read Montessory along Jerry Bruner?
>
> david
>
> On May 3, 2009, at 6:22 PM, Mike Cole wrote:
>
> > I really loved the bit about the kids getting older sooner as the
> > parents
> > get older later so pretty soon the kids will be older than their
> > parents!
> > What struck you about the story, vera?
> > mike
> >
> > On Sun, May 3, 2009 at 12:52 PM, Vera Steiner <vygotsky@unm.edu>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> Hi Mike,
> >> I was delighted to see this article in the Times, the new
> >> administration
> >> needs to hear alternatives to NCLB.
> >> Thanks for sending it out, perhaps we will discuss it a little,
> >> Vera
> >> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Cole" <lchcmike@gmail.com>
> >> To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> >> Sent: Sunda abouy, May 03, 2009 1:26
> >> Subject: [xmca] Kndergarten Cram: When is play?
> >>
> >>
> >> So many people on xmca are interested in play, I could not help
> >> forwarding
> >>> this article which kept me company over lunch.
> >>> Smile, cry,
> >>> Iis a #2 pencil
> >>> sticking in your eye?
> >>> mike
> >>> -------
> >>> Kindergarten Cram New York Times Magazine, The (NY) - Sunday, May
> >>> 3, 2009
> >>> Author: PEGGY ORENSTEIN
> >>> About a year ago, I made the circuit of kindergartens in my town.
> >>> At each
> >>> stop, after the pitch by the principal and the obligatory exhibit
> >>> of art
> >>> projects only a mother (the student's own) could love, I asked the
> >>> same
> >>> question: "What is your policy on homework?"
> >>>
> >>> And always, whether from the apple-cheeked teacher in the public
> >>> school or
> >>> the earnest administrator of the "child centered" private one, I
> >>> was met
> >>> with an eager nod. Oh, yes, each would explain: kindergartners are
> >>> assigned
> >>> homework every day.
> >>>
> >>> Bzzzzzzt. Wrong answer.
> >>>
> >>> When I was a child, in the increasingly olden days, kindergarten
> >>> was a
> >>> place
> >>> to play. We danced the hokeypokey, swooned in suspense over Duck,
> >>> Duck,
> >>> Gray
> >>> Duck (that's what Minnesotans stubbornly call Duck, Duck, Goose) and
> >>> napped
> >>> on our mats until the Wake-Up Fairy set us free.
> >>>
> >>> No more. Instead of digging in sandboxes, today's kindergartners
> >>> prepare
> >>> for
> >>> a life of multiple-choice boxes by plowing through standardized
> >>> tests with
> >>> cuddly names like Dibels (pronounced "dibbles"), a series of
> >>> early-literacy
> >>> measures administered to millions of kids; or toiling over reading
> >>> curricula
> >>> like Open Court -- which features assessments every six weeks.
> >>>
> >>> According to "Crisis in the Kindergarten," a report recently
> >>> released by
> >>> the
> >>> Alliance for Childhood, a nonprofit research and advocacy group,
> >>> all that
> >>> testing is wasted: it neither predicts nor improves young children's
> >>> educational outcomes. More disturbing, along with other academic
> >>> demands,
> >>> like assigning homework to 5-year-olds, it is crowding out the one
> >>> thing
> >>> that truly is vital to their future success: play.
> >>>
> >>> A survey of 254 teachers in New York and Los Angeles the group
> >>> commissioned
> >>> found that kindergartners spent two to three hours a day being
> >>> instructed
> >>> and tested in reading and math. They spent less than 30 minutes
> >>> playing.
> >>> "Play at age 5 is of great importance not just to intellectual but
> >>> emotional, psychological social and spiritual development," says
> >>> Edward
> >>> Miller, the report's co-author. Play -- especially the let's-
> >>> pretend,
> >>> dramatic sort -- is how kids develop higher-level thinking, hone
> >>> their
> >>> language and social skills, cultivate empathy. It also reduces
> >>> stress, and
> >>> that's a word that should not have to be used in the same sentence
> >>> as
> >>> "kindergartner" in the first place.
> >>>
> >>> I came late to motherhood, so I had plenty of time to ponder
> >>> friends'
> >>> mania
> >>> for souped-up childhood learning. How was it that the same couples
> >>> who
> >>> piously proclaimed that 31/2-year-old Junior was not
> >>> "developmentally
> >>> ready"
> >>> to use the potty were drilling him on flashcards? What was the
> >>> rush? Did
> >>> that better prepare kids to learn? How did 5 become the new 7,
> >>> anyway?
> >>>
> >>> There's no single reason. The No Child Left Behind Act, with its
> >>> insistence
> >>> that what cannot be quantified cannot be improved, plays a role.
> >>> But so do
> >>> parents who want to build a better child. There is also what
> >>> marketers
> >>> refer
> >>> to as KGOY -- Kids Getting Older Younger -- their explanation for
> >>> why
> >>> 3-year-olds now play with toys that were initially intended for
> >>> middle-schoolers. (Since adults are staying younger older -- 50 is
> >>> the new
> >>> 30! -- our children may soon surpass us in age.)
> >>>
> >>> Regardless of the cause, Miller says, accelerating kindergarten is
> >>> unnecessary: any early advantage fades by fourth grade. "It makes
> >>> a parent
> >>> proud to see a child learn to read at age 4, but in terms of
> >>> what's really
> >>> best for the kid, it makes no difference." For at-risk kids,
> >>> pushing too
> >>> soon may backfire. The longitudinal High/Scope Preschool Curriculum
> >>> Comparison Study followed 68 such children, who were divided between
> >>> instruction- and play-based classrooms. While everyone's I.Q. scores
> >>> initially rose, by age 15, the former group's academic achievement
> >>> plummeted. They were more likely to exhibit emotional problems and
> >>> spent
> >>> more time in special education. "Drill and kill," indeed.
> >>>
> >>> Thinkers like Daniel Pink have proposed that this country's
> >>> continued
> >>> viability hinges on what is known as the "imagination economy":
> >>> qualities
> >>> like versatility, creativity, vision -- and playfulness -- that
> >>> cannot be
> >>> outsourced. It's a compelling argument to apply here, though a bit
> >>> disheartening too: must we append the word "economy" to everything
> >>> to
> >>> legitimize it? Isn't cultivating imagination an inherent good? I
> >>> would
> >>> hate
> >>> to see children's creativity subject to the same parental anxiety
> >>> that has
> >>> stoked the sales of Baby Einstein DVDs.
> >>>
> >>> Jean Piaget famously referred to "the American question," which
> >>> arose when
> >>> he lectured in this country: how, his audiences wanted to know,
> >>> could a
> >>> child's development be sped up? The better question may be: Why
> >>> are we so
> >>> hellbent on doing so?
> >>>
> >>> Maybe the current economic retrenchment will trigger a new
> >>> perspective on
> >>> early education, something similar to the movement toward local,
> >>> sustainable, organic food. Call it Slow Schools. After all, part
> >>> of what
> >>> got
> >>> us into this mess was valuing achievement, speed and results over
> >>> ethics,
> >>> thoughtfulness and responsibility. Then again, parents may glean the
> >>> opposite lesson, believing their kids need to be pushed even
> >>> harder in
> >>> order
> >>> to stay competitive in a shrinking job market.
> >>>
> >>> I wonder how far I'm willing to go in my commitment to the cause:
> >>> would I
> >>> embrace the example of Finland -- whose students consistently come
> >>> out on
> >>> top in international assessments -- and delay formal reading
> >>> instruction
> >>> until age 7? Could I stick with that position when other second
> >>> graders
> >>> were
> >>> gobbling up "War and Peace" -- or at least the third Harry Potter
> >>> book?
> >>>
> >>> In the end, the school I found for my daughter holds off on
> >>> homework until
> >>> fourth grade. (Though a flotilla of research shows homework
> >>> confers no
> >>> benefit -- enhancing neither retention nor study habits -- until
> >>> middle
> >>> school.) It's a start. A few days ago, though, I caught her
> >>> concocting a
> >>> pretend math worksheet. "All the other kids have homework," she
> >>> complained
> >>> with a sigh. "I wish I could have some, too."
> >>>
> >>> Peggy Orenstein, a contributing writer, is the author of "Waiting
> >>> for
> >>> Daisy," a memoir.
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> xmca mailing list
> >>> xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> >>> http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
> > xmca mailing list
> > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
>
> David Preiss, Ph.D.
> Escuela de Psicología
> Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
> Av Vicuña Mackenna - 4860
> 7820436 Macul
> Santiago, Chile
>
> Fono: 3544605
> Fax: 3544844
> e-mail: davidpreiss@uc.cl
> web personal: http://web.mac.com/ddpreiss/
> web institucional: http://www.epuc.cl/profesores/dpreiss
>
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