The Onion thought it was hilarious when it published a satirical article about online classes for preschoolers. A make-believe author of a make-believe report from the U.S. Department of Education said: “With access to their Show-And-Tell message boards, recess timers, and live webcams of class turtle tanks, most toddlers are finding that they can receive the same experience of traditional preschooling from the comfort of their parents’ living room or home office. In addition, most cited the ability to listen to their teacher’s recordings of story time at their own pace as a significant benefit of choosing an online nursery school.”
But now reality has overtaken satire, in less than four months. There really is a company offering virtual preschool, promising to get toddlers ready for the Common Core. The advertising plays to parents’ fears that their children won’t be ready for kindergarten.
Benjamin Herold of Education Week spoke to early childhood experts, who expressed skepticism about putting little children in front of a computer.
Valerie Strauss is suitably alarmed by the prospect of marketing computer-based activities to the parents of little children. Some of the materials are prepared for little ones from 18 months to three years old.
But, she notes:
It also offers material for 4-year-olds, who the Web site says will turn into 5-year-old kindergartners expected to learn material aligned to the Common Core State Standards (which, incidentally call for kids to read in kindergarten). So 4 years old is almost too late to start getting prepared for the academic sweatshop that is kindergarten. The Web site says:
“The preparation needs to start when your child is 4, if not earlier. VINCI Virtual School provides you with a ready-to-go curriculum to make your time more effective, with the structured lessons and with the focus on building literacy and math skills while broaden knowledge on science.”
It should be noted that the American Academy of Pediatrics and the White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity have recommended that children under the age of 2 get no screen time. None. Not from TV, the Internet or smart devices.
And, presumably, not from virtual preschool.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
This is virtually ridiculous.
Actually, we all laugh at it and we all know it’s silly, but the people pushing Common Core just keep marching on and no one stops them.
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SafeLibraries: don’t be caught by surprise when the promoters/sales people for the virtual classes for toddlers deflect questioning by claiming that doubters and critics like teachers and parents just don’t understand how to educate and nurture the little tykes.
Followed up by not sitting THEIR OWN CHILDREN in front of computer screens but sending them to real schools in the real world taught by real teachers.
Too farfetched to take seriously?
This blog, 5-23-2014, “Common Core for Commoners, Not My School!”
Entire posting:
“This is an unintentionally hilarious story about Common Core in Tennessee. Dr. Candace McQueen has been dean of Lipscomb College’s school of education and also the state’s’s chief cheerleader for Common Core. However, she was named headmistress of private Lipscomb Academy, and guess what? She will not have the school adopt the Common Core! Go figure.”
Link: https://dianeravitch.net/2014/03/23/common-core-for-commoners-not-my-school/
The thread is worth reading too.
The self-styled “education reformers.” Double standards, double think, double speak.
Nailed to the wall long long ago by a very dead and very old and very Greek guy:
“Hateful to me as are the gates of hell, Is he who, hiding one thing in his heart, Utters another.” [Homer]
😎
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Thanks. It’s so unbelievable. And we sheep do too little to stop it.
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This the theater of the absurd! Experts in child development need to voice their concerns loud and clear. These vulture capitalists will stop at nothing to make a buck!
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Don’t know if I qualify as an expert, but with 17 years of experience in early childhood education and Early Intervention ( birth to five) as well as a Master’s degree, I feel I can speak to this absurdity. The research is very clear that infants, toddlers, and preschoolers learn best from social interactions and hands-on discovery learning with real life physical contact. The give and take of actually communicating and navigating in a social context that can only be developed through contact with other human beings has been proven in research studies. See the YouTube vodeos by Joanne Deak and others who explain the neuroscience behind this. Busy parents who are led to believe that plugging their children into technology as the latest and greatest in education will do irreparable harm to the developing brains of their children. But who gives a cr@# about science? Give them some floor time and wooden blocks with another human being and watch them develop neuropathways that will last a lifetime.
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JoAnn Deak, Ph.D
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OMG! My heart is weeping for those babies. And I am frightened for society.
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Preparation for school, and life, begins in the mother’s womb with healthy food and lifestyle. Once outside the womb, loving care and common sense go a long way in preparing kids for formal education settings. Period.
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Fear-mongering works all too well when directed at parents of infants, toddlers, and pre-schoolers. It’s also true that a 4 yo. can navigate a tablet or smart phone way better than I can, so all the more reason to fear this marketing strategy.
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“The Common Insanity”
A Common Insanity
Has taken form
A standard inanity
Of ed reform
“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results” — Albert Einstein
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I visited the website for these thieves and fools — VINCI Virtual School. What a terrible joke on parents and what a crime against children. My fear is that some money hungry corporation like Pearson through their Connection Academy virtual schools and/or K12, Inc. will pick up on this crazy idea, take it to the charter school backers who take it to the Arne Duncan, Legislators, Governors, and Bill Gates, and then we will see the race to see how many toddler and preschool charter schools can be started across America. This is just another one of the fear tactics used by the money hungry corporations who care less about the educational success or failure of children. Parents are becoming so afraid of the public education system in America that they are worried that if their new borns right of the womb don’t start school then they will not be successful in life. What happened to learning to talk, walk, run, and play before having the brain of a child overloaded with facts and figures?
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CCFC is an organization dedicated to limiting commercial impact on kids. Naturally, they’ve taken on screens. See this:
“As if urging parents to use television or tablets with babies isn’t bad enough, AT&T has partnered with BabyFirst to introduce the first-ever “second screen” experience for infants and toddlers. The new BabyFirstTV U-verse app encourages babies to use an iPad while watching TV.”
http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/action/att
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And this:
“The Apptivity Seat is a bouncy seat for an infant—with a place for an iPad directly above the baby’s face, blocking his or her view of the rest of the world. Babies are literally a captive audience.”
http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/action/tell-fisher-price-no-ipad-bouncy-seats-infants
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It is never too soon to get the little ones career and college ready. If they are going to be reading and analyzing non-fiction in Kindergarten, then we really need to accelerate their skills in preschool. After all, our toddlers are going to have to compete with toddlers from China to go to a good elementary school. So what we need is a higher bar for computer testing of toddlers to see which Preschools are failing. Moving to all online testing will save time and money as we will no longer have to teach toddlers how to hold a pencil. We should be able to look a three year old in the eye and tell them if they are career and college ready. What a wonderous Brave New World the billionaires have created for our children – all in the name of saving the children from their wicked teachers.
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Honestly I am not surprised that an idea such as this one has came up. With society becoming increasingly technological, and 6 year olds knowing how to work a smartphone or computer better than an adult, theoretically preschoolers could learn virtually. However, I too feel that this idea is absurd and would disrupt valuable learning processes and motor function that comes from interacting in a physical and social environment. It appeals to the parents who are afraid of the public school system or do not have time to teach their children themselves. A virtual school for preschooler’s would create a generation of students who do not know how to learn with others and create social connections that are so extremely valuable to a successful and well-rounded life.
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The name of the virtual preschool is interesting. Vinci is Latin for “chains.” Sort of symbolic, no? How children can be chained to and by computers
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Isn’t that what Obama promised, “Chains you can believe in”?
“Hope and Chains”
Regimes change
But core remains
To rearrange
The Hope and Chains
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This idea is so despicable that any comment I might make here is sure to be removed, post haste. But you get the idea. My 50 years in education, 36 in the classroom and 20 years in near-physiology gives me some insights here. How about we treat children like true sentient beings.
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Here’s a link to a research on why electronic devices are unsafe for kids…
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2213879X14000583
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Is this really any different than Baby Einstein or maybe ABC Mouse dot com? Both of those have been around for a while. But a real “online class” requires direct interaction between student and teacher. Will these tots be filling out worksheets and submitting them to their “teacher”? Will they be required to get on their webcam for a discussion session?
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Lets not throw the baby out with the bath water.
I am definitely against virtual schools, except in cases where children are unable to leave their homes due to illness or anxiety.
However, I had my own children on the computer at an early age. Even my older ones attended a Mommy and Me class on the old Apple IIe (it was new then). We did Sticky Bear and other silly learning games in a computer lab up at UB.
By the time my other children were born we had a Mac LC, and my son, with a learning disability, learned his ABCs with Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. I also took him to a center to utilize an experimental online program to help restructure his processing so he could learn better (called Fast Forward). Earobics was also a big help.
The difference is that I was implementing these “lessons” WITH my child (except the Fast Forward which was done at the Buffalo Hearing and Speech Center and the Earobics which was part of his Speech program at school).
Currently, I sit with my preschool grandson utilizing apps together which I have downloaded onto my iPad. Here, too, we sit together and interact while viewing the “video”.
I guess what I object to is using technology in place of instruction instead of using it to supplement or enrich learning. I used to be criticized for showing videos as a part of my library lessons. Yet every video/DVD I showed had a direct relation to the content I was teaching, and I had a running commentary throughout, although I also made my choices based on the enjoyment factor. Sometimes the professionals, with music and sound effects, could do a better job than I could.
As an aside: I had a class of four year olds who were obsessed with trucks. I found a video about trucks and they were mesmerized. Yes, I read them stories about trucks, but actually seeing the vehicles in action was more compelling than my mere words. No contest.
Oh, and by the way, all four of my children are adept with the computer, especially with their jobs. Technology is here to stay and needs to be a part of a child’s education.
Ellen T Klock
Former School Librarian
Buffalo Public Schools
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The key: everything in moderation.
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The Golden Mean, eh!?!?!
Yep the concept has been around for a while. An old now passed on Greek guy spoke of this a couple of millenia ago-you know-Aristotle.
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If it’s an idea that can turn a profit, it will happen.
The problem is Capitalism!
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