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Kindergarten should be fun for children and therefore missing days due to the harsh winter shouldn't have any effect in this situation.
Where were you when legislators began mandating that kindergarten should be about getting ready for college and career? The Common Core standards were drafted by starting at the goal, college and career readiness, and working backwards to get to age 5. There was never any alignment with the benchmarks of maturity accepted in the fields associated with child development. As a result, there is an alarming mismatch between what is normal and typical development for children and the tasks that the Common Core expects them to master.
Fun has nothing to do with getting ready for college and career. If you want that to change, you have to change the laws in nearly 50 states. Remember, the jobs of the school staff depend in very large part to the scores the children earn on secret tests that purport to measure mastery of these develomentally inappropriate tasks, so they are torn between pushing the children and doing what they know is right for them. It doesn't seem like fun at all for the children, many of whom cry and get physically ill while feeling stupid for doing things that children their age have never been able to do.
Of course, the people who developed the Common Core mostly put their children in private schools where they aren't subjected to such treatment. They probably have their class plays every year. Yet another plus for private schools.
Where were you when legislators began mandating that kindergarten should be about getting ready for college and career? The Common Core standards were drafted by starting at the goal, college and career readiness, and working backwards to get to age 5. There was never any alignment with the benchmarks of maturity accepted in the fields associated with child development. As a result, there is an alarming mismatch between what is normal and typical development for children and the tasks that the Common Core expects them to master.
Fun has nothing to do with getting ready for college and career. If you want that to change, you have to change the laws in nearly 50 states. Remember, the jobs of the school staff depend in very large part to the scores the children earn on secret tests that purport to measure mastery of these develomentally inappropriate tasks, so they are torn between pushing the children and doing what they know is right for them. It doesn't seem like fun at all for the children, many of whom cry and get physically ill while feeling stupid for doing things that children their age have never been able to do.
Of course, the people who developed the Common Core mostly put their children in private schools where they aren't subjected to such treatment. They probably have their class plays every year. Yet another plus for private schools.
And rather than perfecting their operations (add, subtract, multiply and divide) they move on to algebraic word problems, geometric manipulation and table and graph interpretation.
It's no wonder they enter middle school not knowing their multiplication tables nor knowing long division.
There's no time in the earlier grades to focus on it for any length of time to master it.
Chava, this issue was mis-represented in the medai and taken out of context. It's been discussed and explained on the Long Island forum.
The letter being passed around by the various media outlets was merely a follow-up letter to a letter written by the district explaining the cancellation. Most people in the district are not upset and understand the reasons.
The winter weather was brutal this year on Long Island and there was an unusual amount of school cancellations. This year's high number of "school days' follows the previous year where school was closed for weeks due to the aftermath (no power) from Hurricane Sandy. There was also an unusual number of delayed openings this year due to the weather. Elwood has half day kindergarten. With the delayed openings, the morning kindergarten classes were shortened or cancelled while the afternoon kindergarten classes had a regular school day. The morning sessions had lost a great deal of time, unlike their afternoon counterparts, and those kindergarteners were finding themselves at a great disadvantage. It had nothing to do with common core or going to college. The orignial first letter, which was ignored by the media, explained all of this.
Our daughter's kindergarten focuses more on emotional and social development with less focus on reading, writing and math. And we're fine with that. The kids in her class are so sweet. The last thing they would cancel, I would think, is a end-of-year show.
They're 5. How many more school days before college?
I agree with you. The skills the students gain while working on a class presentation are ironically much more likely to help the students develop into college-ready high school graduates than endless test-prep sessions. But try to tell that to the state legislators who believe that they have to get tough on schools who are babying babies. The teachers know better, but they have lives and mortgages, and they don't need to lose their jobs as long as they can hang on until this fad has passed. And they always do pass. Talk to anyone who has taught for two or more decades. What is old is new to the young guys who end up in control with their cronies in the ancillary businesses where all the money is (laundered).
Fortunately, parents are getting fed up with the effect that all the test prep is having on their children. As more parents speak up, and especially when high-profile parents like Louis C. K. go viral in the media, the Common Core-test prep-textbook materials-charter schools conglomeration begins to fall apart. There is hope that soon, public schools will return to local control, and neighborhoods will get their schools back. Then we can restore the tradition of class plays and field trips, which also take a hit to test prep.
Kindergarten should be fun for children and therefore missing days due to the harsh winter shouldn't have any effect in this situation.
In this case, it did affect it because when there were delayed openings, the morning kindergarten was cancelled or a very short session, while the afternoon class had a regular day. Also, I am sure that the music teacher's schedule was messed up as well when there was a delayed opening, especially if he/she has to travel to more than one school during the day. NYC schools rarely closee for inclement weather, but Long Island schools will close or have delayed openings or early dismissal more frequently.
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