Pre-K

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.

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.

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.

On Friday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry vetoed legislation, passed by the state legislature, to enhance pre-k standards in the state. Gov.

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.

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.

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.

Ever since the release of Reroute the Preschool Juggernaut, a new book by Fordham Foundation president Chester Finn, we have heard a growing chorus of rebuttals from leaders in the early childhood community to Finn's 123-page argument against universal pre-K. Yesterday, W. Stephen Barnett, co-director of the National Institute for Early Education Research, published his own 14-point critique of Finn's reasoning.

One features caped superheroes who fly "into" classic stories like The Three Little Pigs, using their knowledge of letters and words to change the endings. (Don't worry, there's still plenty of huffing and puffing.) The other one puts words front and center, turning them into props and lead characters, such as the wooly wonder whose body is actually formed out of cushiony-looking, three-dimensional letters of S H E E P.