Technical Report: Kindergarten Early Learning Scale | nieer.org

Technical Report: Kindergarten Early Learning Scale | nieer.org

Development........

I feel the need to discuss development.  Development is thrown around a lot when discussing children and education, however I do not think everyone that throws the word around truly has an understanding of what development is.  As an educator I feel the need to educate more than just my students.  

Definition of development:

: the act or process of growing or causing something to grow or become larger or more advanced

: the act or process of creating something over a period of time

: the state of being created or made more advanced

Development is something that happens when sperm meets egg.  That fast it starts. The final outcome is not always the same.  Depending on the specific situation and make up of those early cells, the outcome can be different.  As a woman who struggled with infertility and had many friends who had an even harder time than I did, I know how precious and fragile that biology is, how fragile that development is.  Even in cases where the situation is perfect and the environment is ideal and the health of all involved are at its best, sometimes the development is shifted or changed and the outcome is not a happy healthy baby.  Would anyone dare tell that mother she was a failure and should not have any more children and do not try again? I certainly hope not. 

A typical pregnancy should last 40 weeks.  As a mother who had all 3 of my children before 40 weeks, should I be considered gifted?  No.  Those mothers who go past 40 weeks, should they be considered slow, or failures? Certainly not.  Sometimes medical professions intervene and help support and provide the necessary interventions to provide the best possible outcome.  Are those interventions always the most successful? Do they work the first time without every having to do them again? No. Should the medical professionals be fired or told they are failures when the outcome is not positive? This would depend on the case, however the majority of the time the answer is usually no.  

Now there is an infant to care for and raise and support and provide for.  Do they all sleep through the night at the same time? Should we create standards that tell parents by week 8 your child should be sleeping through the night in their own crib without any assistance from you? Anyone who is a parent or has experience with infants knows how absurd that is.  I recently read an article about creating standards for children to learn to walk and there should be centers created for those toddlers who are not walking by a certain age.  Its a great read!  The idea is completely absurd and for the most part people who read it know that.  I can not just state that ALL children should be walking by age 1.  Some children are just not biologically ready for that.  It does not make them failures, or slow, or behind.  

Development is a sliding scale and different for all cases.  Children are not all potty trained at the same week of their life.  Not all children cut a tooth the same time of their lives.  Every child is different.  Every child in the same family is different. 

Why does that not apply once a child walks through the school doors?  Why is the teacher considered a failure or worse at their job when a child does not meet the same milestone as the rest of their peers as the same time? Why is pressure put on these children to perform above and beyond their comfort zone in order to prove to someone who does not know them, does not personally have any invested time in their life, that they are meeting the standards created without them in mind?

Here is another absurd example of development.  Let's pretend I was given 25 different seeds to plant and was told I had 30 days to grow a flower, and then I would be evaluated on the success of the task.  I was not given all the same kind of seeds.  I was not given the same dirt to put those seeds in.  I was given 25 of the same exact cup though.  I can't help but wonder, do all these seeds yield a flower?  How old are all these seeds?  Have they been protected before being given to me or are some burned a little, or have any of them been frozen? I can try and make sure I care for and provide the right amount of water and sun and try to give those seeds extra nutrients if I see its struggling to grow.  However every night they would be taken away to go to someone else's house for the night.  I had no control over the conditions when they were away from me.  At the end of 30 days Im sure you can only imagine the differences in plants I would have.  Some may have a flower... some may just have some leaves and show promise for future flowering.... some may be barely peeking out of the dirt and I'm sure (knowing my green thumb) some would have nothing. However I will be judged on each seed. 

As a teacher I am judged on each student, and how much they grow.  I am made to feel like a failure when a student does not meet the same goal as the rest, however I know that child and I know the successes they have, but its just not good enough. 

I get 20 some new students every year, coming to me with different backgrounds.  Some have great supportive and loving homes and have been protected and are ready to be in school and learn.  Some have had to deal with things in their short 4 or 5 years that I could not even imagine in my 37 years, therefore they are not ready, their development has been stunted.  However because some group of people sitting in some town far away who know NOTHING of the struggles of my students sitting in front of me have decided what they should know in the 180 days that I have them.  And if they do not meet those standards it is my fault, and I am a failure, and I am held responsible.  I can not affect biology.  I can not push, force, or shove information into these children's minds.  I have my interventions and I have my tricks and my hopes that I can get them where they need to be.  It doesn't always work.  Sometimes they just aren't ready.  It makes no difference how hard I say "You must know this!", if they are not ready, they are not ready.  

WHY???  WHY?? is it ok for those who know NOTHING of my students or their lives or my interventions to come in and tell me how horrible I am because they have not met some silly standard.  

How many kids play make-believe now?  Not many.  How many kids know how to cooperate with others?  Not many.  How many kids know how to problem solve? Not many.  How many kids know how to play appropriately?  Not many. How many kids know how to talk and interact with adults and even their peers appropriately?  Not many. 

How many kids know zombies?  A lot!  How many kids stay up later than their parents?  A lot!  How many kids watch rated R movies at the age of 5?  A lot!  How many kids use profanity, correctly at the age of 5? A lot!  How many children know or see sex acts at the age of 5?  A lot!!  How many children do not know where they are going at the end of the school day? who will be home? will they eat dinner? A LOT!!!  How many kids are capable of meeting the standards set in front of them to meet?  A lot!  However not all students are ready at the same time. Some students need more time, some need less, and all should be given that time.  

After 20 minutes on 1 question.... a 5 year old begins to cry!!!

I feel the need to help explain why the reading test for my students today causes such a struggle in me.  This is only one example but I think it’s a good one.  I teach kindergarten (most of you know this I'm sure) and that means the majority of my students have never been to school.  They are only 5 years old for usually the first half of the school year, some starting at 4 still and turning 5 within the first month or so.  5 YEARS OLD!!!  That’s it!!!  Ok so today was our 85^th day in school.  So after 85 days of school (for their entire 5 years of life) we are giving them a 57 question test on reading in the computer lab for the 2^nd time this school year.  Yes I said 2^nd!  We were so nice to welcome these sometimes 4 and 5 year old children to school the first few weeks of their school career and tested them on the computer… 57 questions for reading and I'm sure its close to that for math (I don’t remember right now).

So 85 days of school total, their entire lives, and we are going to test them and tell them this is important and your parents, teacher, the principal and future teachers are going to look at this number and know what you learned in kindergarten.  (BTW- I DON’T TELL MY STUDENTS THIS!!!  I tell them to try their best and I already know how smart they are!)  So no pressure!  YEAH RIGHT!!??!!  They do as they are told because really what other choice do they have.  They sit and listen to the question and all the answers and try to pick the best answer and move on. 

After answering 9 questions this student (who is a very bright student) is asked to fix the highlighted word in the sentence because it is spelled incorrectly.  So the highlighted word was ‘frum’.  I could tell she was having a hard time.  She moved the ‘f’ to the first space and the ‘m’ to the last space.  And she sat there…. She asked me and I told her she has to take her best guess….. she struggled.  I could see it in her face she didn’t understand why ‘frum’ was wrong and she knew she had to change the spelling.  She couldn’t move on until she had 4 letters up on the lines.  She tried asking another teacher who gave the same response.  At this point some students are getting close to finishing and she continues to sit staring at the computer screen and playing with the mouse.  She did not want to get this wrong.  She wanted to get the highest score she possibly could.  I know she was telling herself she should be able to spell this but was really having a hard time.  Why?  Why was she struggling so hard with ‘frum’.  Why?  Because she’s 5, she has had 85 days of school and has been taught to use her sounds to spell words she didn’t know!!  /F/ /R/ /U/ /M/ are the sounds!!!!!!!!  She could not wrap her head around why that was wrong.  From is not a kindergarten word!!  We have not used that word much if at all!!  She didn’t want to do bad on her test….. after 20 minutes I finally went back over to her and said pick any two letters and put them in there and move on…. It’s one question, it’s ok!!!  And she started crying, which just about made me start crying!!  SHE IS 5 YEARS OLD!!!!  She should NOT be this stressed out to the point of crying because a word that SHE WOULD spell 'frum', is spelled wrong. 

We paused her test… I told her to take a deep breath which only made her cry more.  Then I told her to go out in the hall and get a drink of water……. She came back in and another teacher sat with her and helped her just move on….. She calmed and at the end of our 45 min time period (I think she stayed a few minutes later)…. She still has 11 more questions to go. 

I told my entire class that I was SUPER impressed with how well they did (and I was!!!) and that I was beyond proud of them!!  But I am still… 7 hours after this incident…. Troubled that this student was crying over that question……  Nothing that I do for my students should EVER make them cry like that!!  NEVER!