This was written by a teacher in Chicago:
An open letter to Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan
Dear Secretary Duncan:
Children gleefully line blocks end to end on a rug measuring its area, two girls huddle over a water table experimenting with liquid capacity, and several students use clay making sculptures as well as refining their small motor skills – this is the picture of a preschool where any of us would want to send our children.
As an early childhood educator, I was thrilled to hear President Obama’s strong focus on preschool education in the State of the Union address. We have a preponderance of research evidence that tells us quality early childhood education makes a difference in the learning lives of children, and providing expanded opportunities for parents and children is a step in the right direction.
Yet, there are many concerns as this policy unfolds.
It is understandable that when the government spends money on a program that there should be accountability to the public. It is a grave concern, however, that most of the policy you create uses standardized testing as the measure of success in education. A regimen of intensive testing is counterproductive and against developmentally appropriate early childhood practice. Children do not need to experience their first feelings of defeat at the hands of a test when they are three.
On the other hand, we have plenty of well-researched claims that can judge the quality of early childhood programs. The National Association of the Education of Young Children developed guidelines for accreditation that could easily be transformed into assessment of quality. I urge you, Secretary Duncan, to evaluate programs – not children.
Another concern is that the Department of Education promotes the use of testing data to drive instruction. Early childhood educators do not use standardized tests to guide our teaching. We use a wealth of well-founded knowledge of child development that we have accumulated over the years through highly respected psychologists and educators such as Montessori, Piaget, Erikson, and Dewey. We do not need tests to drive instruction – our instruction is driven by knowledge of childhood.
We also need to realize that high-quality early childhood education does not “just happen.” It takes skilled educators who fully understand child development and the needs of the whole child (social and emotional as well as academic). Please make sure that any government funded program insists on certified early childhood educators. Preschool should not be like elementary school for a reason, and it needs to be implemented by educators with specialized knowledge of young children.
I am sure you remember visiting your children’s preschool. Did it feel like the opening scenario of this letter? Were children joyfully playing and creating under the guidance and care of knowledgeable educators? This is the preschool we want for our nation’s children.
Signed,
Michelle Strater Gunderson
Early Childhood Committee Chairperson
Chicago Teachers Union
Teaching is an “Art.” It is not a factory producing cloned widgets. This is where they got it wrong. Should students be tested to see if they are at grade level? For sure. Do you need these constant tests? No. What you need is the old fashioned weekly tests in the classroom and the homework. It worked for us. Once a year we took a major test. The prep was what happened previous to that. The real tragedy is the early education, Pre-K to 3rd or 5th grade failing. Every study shows that if a child is not at grade level by the third grade they are on the path to failure. We cannot wait until the third grade. It must be discovered at the beginning and then remediated immediately. Why wait for failure. Young children’s minds are like a sponge sucking up information at that age. Give them all the possibilities. Expose them to art and science. They will suck it up like a super sponge. The personality requirements for early education teachers is unique. Do we allow for this?
Just as preschool should not be like elementary school, neither should the primary grades be like middle school. We need to provide enriching and engaging experiences for all children at their developmental levels. Primary age students should not be sitting at desks all day listening to teachers droning on and on. They should not be expected to regurgitate information on a standardized test and have us claim that it is “learning”. And we should not assume because a child has not mastered a particular concept at the tender age of 5, 6, or 7, that somehow that child (or his/her teacher) is a failure.
Middle school shouldn’t be about sitting at desks and droning teachers, either. Nor should high school. And claiming that “learning” has occurred because of scores on a standardized test should not happen at any age.
Agreed! I didn’t make it clear in my response that I thought these practices were inappropriate at any age: I was just speaking as an elementary school teacher being forced to teach in developmentally inappropriate ways thanks to the “teacher-proof” lessons we are handed.
The same can be said for best practices in Higher Education where, for the past couple decades, professors have often received trainings in the adult learner as active participant, and they have been encouraged to demonstrate that lectures alone are not their only method of instruction. In Higher Ed, standardized tests have been used less and less for entry, as 800 colleges today do not require the ACT/SAT, and they have never been typically used for determining who graduates.
As Obama/Duncan and their non-educator cronies have set their sights on Early Childhood and Higher Ed during this term, all of that is set to change, to the advantage of curriculum and assessment companies, including the SAT and the College Board (aka David Coleman), as well as corporations interested in hiring obedient workers for low paying jobs, regardless of their level of education. (As evidenced by the millions of under-employed college graduates today, many hungry people are willing to take virtually any job in order to put food on the table and pay the rent.)
If this administration has its way, P – 20 education is likely to consist of the outdated carrot and stick, filling of the pail, Skinnerian Behavioral operant conditioning approach, which promotes scripted instruction and passive learning, and where, with the use of technology, there will be no need for live teachers or public school buildings.
No worries, Lehrer. I didn’t think you were only commenting on elementary schools. I just wanted to emphasize. I teach middle school, and I can get away with some lecture, but I have to have hands-on, as well.
Why doesn’t Duncan lobby to end the sequester and fund Head Start?
Too mundane? Not transformational enough? Beneath him?
Does he know how dumb it sounds to people when he’s “planning” to expand preschool when he can’t even manage to secure funding for the preschools we have?
Maybe he could reallocate some of the tens of millions he gave to Teach For America to Head Start, you know, the preschool program that exists, where real live children go to school.
TFA is sitting on a huge pile of billionaire bucks. I have no idea why I’m subsidizing a glorified temp agency.
Less transformational CEO-style “genius” and more competent governance, please. Fix it, Mr. Duncan, then you can talk about grand expansions.
Chiara is correct. The sequester is coming to Head Start. What are we, the early childhood community, going to do about it? Will there be any group action? Will we be encouraged to write letter, call our congress people, etc.? How can we stand by and allow this to happen? Summer programs are being cut as I write this. How can we talk about closing the achievement gap or any of the other gaps that exist among different social groups of children by cutting the programs that help? We need to organize and be a voice for Head Start kids and all our kids.
Nice Letter.
Helps preserve the illusion that Arne gives a … (read my ellipsis) …
Michelle, you are writing to a non-educator who is bought by wacky billionaires. Your logic and experience is falling on deaf ears. Anyone with any classroom experience knows that children, especially at that young age, develop at different rates. I know someone who didn’t learn to truly read until the fourth grade. This person is a competent individual that functions well in society. According to the loons in Washington, he and his teacher would be labeled as failures at a very young age. Totally foolish. I’d like to think that the Sec. of Ed. would listen to educators, but he doesn’t. He listens to super wealthy people who know very little about education. When does this man get put out of office?
Thank you for writing a very coherent and compelling letter. I especially appreciated the focus on learning through play and on the idea of evaluating programs rather than children. We, as a field, need to keep saying this to whomever will listen!
I too thought that NAEYC would lead the charge against the testing madness of young children. However, a glance at the website will lead one to wonder. Race to the Top Early Childhood, curriculum, assessment, evaluation, readiness. Three year olds.
To the dismay of many Early Childhood Educators who are committed to developmentally appropriate practice (DAP), NAEYC changed course several years ago, with the release of the last edition of the DAP book, which purposely omitted Piaget.
Please read the Defending the Early Years Project’s letter to NAEYC from January, 2013 and consider joining the project and taking action: http://deyproject.org/open-letter-to-naeyc/
What on earth is the nature of the assessments???
Standardized tests. They vary somewhat by program, but basically, in the Race to the Top – Early Learning Challenge and Head Start, they are to be used to screen and measure student progress in meeting standards and school readiness goals, assess learning environments, teacher-student interactions, etc.(They also want entry exams in Kindergarten and data warehousing.)
One must assume that if preschool programs are expanded, in order to obtain federal funds, all these tests will also be required then, too. It’s the Obama/Duncan carrot and stick approach, regardless of the ages of the students.
Anyone who has ever been required to test crying babies just so the feds can have their data knows that this is a very cruel introduction to school for these young children.
Honestly, I’m wondering what purpose does this serve?
It’s a competition for federal funds.
You can see the emphasis on assessment in the Race to the Top- Early Learning Challenge application form here: http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop-earlylearningchallenge/2011-412.doc
Note that it says assessments must be valid and reliable, including formative assessments, which means they must be standardized tests.
Head Start regulations can be found here: http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/standards/Head%20Start%20Requirements/45%20CFR%20Chapter%20XIII/45%20CFR%20Chap%20XIII_ENG.pdf
Isn’t it curious how so much money goes into education reform and policy by people so out of touch it’s nearly criminal. So much good work goes unrecognized and the Tsunami of flawed policy and teacher bashing will continue as long as the big money rewards the reformers; not the humble teacher that continues to fight the good fight. In my heart children come first above all else and there is no policy for inspired teaching. Teachers will always be greater than the sun of their parts.
“I am sure you remember visiting your children’s preschool. Did it feel like the opening scenario of this letter? Were children joyfully playing and creating under the guidance and care of knowledgeable educators? This is the preschool we want for our nation’s children.”
When Arne Duncan was CEO of the Chicago Public Schools (CPS), his kids attended a public school. In a speech he gave at a city-wide, start of the school year meeting of CPS ECE teachers at Orchestra Hall, he talked about how wonderful his son’s CPS preschool program was.
I never knew which school his kids were in, but those were the days when preschool teachers had a range of curricular choices, including Reggio Emilia and Project Approach. Play was accepted as being integral to young children’s learning and frequent standardized testing of was NOT the norm then.
Arne wants something entirely different for other people’s children.
Correction: That should have been “frequent standardized testing of kids”
While I agree with the spirit of this letter, that early childhood education’s results cannot be measured with standardized testing, and that children need play as the foundation for future learning, I am concerned about the push for certified teachers and the possibility that parents will no longer be considered good enough to stay home with and care for their child. As long as we call it “preschool” and push for “certified teachers” we are stuck in the paradigm of chair and desk and test bound education. I guess I don’t want to toss out the baby (the importance of caring for the child and the relationship between care tender and child) with the bathwater (standardized testing) as the race to funding care of the very young marches on.