The New Preschool System is Crushing Kids and Making Them Hate LearningBy Anna Hunt The studys researchers, Daphna Bassok, Scott Latham and Anna Rorem, compared kindergarten classrooms between 1998 and 2010 using two large nationally representative datasets. The aspects analyzed included teachers expectations, time spent on academic versus non-academic content, classroom organization, and standardized testing. Their assessment revealed that the experience in kindergarten has changed dramatically: Kindergarten teachers in the later period held far higher academic expectations for children both prior to kindergarten entry and during the kindergarten year. They devote more time to advanced literacy and math content, teacher-directed instruction and assessment, and substantially less time to art, music, science and child-selected activities. (Study: Is Kindergarten the New First Grade?) The study by Bassok et al. uncovered that kindergarten literacy rates increased from 30% in 1998 to 80% in 2010. Of course, it is a beautiful thing when a child learns to read, but are American children being driven to their detriment? The researchers think so. They concluded that kindergarten, which used to be a gentle way to help introduce children to school, now serves more as a gatekeeper, which indoctrinates children into the pressured life of a student. Young children, even in preschool, are expected to sit at desks for longer and longer periods and use pencil and paper, even though many of them lack the attention span or motor skills to be successful. Failure even at this young age can earn children the label attention deficitdisorder, and even in some cases can be held back, having to spend an extra year in kindergarten. This undue accountability and pressure placed on children as young as 5 and 6 years old is making them frightened of making mistakes and of being wrong. This limits their future willingness to be creative and come up with original ideas because they may not the right. A growing group of educators and parents in the U.S. is becoming increasingly frustrated by the Common Core education programs and too much focus on academics and standardized testing. Some believe that the initiative is actually dumbing down children, leaving students unprepared to do college level work and putting pressure on colleges to lower their academic standards. Common Core pretended that it was going to be raising standards, but what it did, in fact, is put enormous pressure on colleges, many of which are now succumbing to that pressure, to lower their standards. ~ Peter Wood, president of the National Association of Scholars Kindergartens in the U.S. are also subject to Common Core guidelines, creating more emphasis on seat work and relying on tightly scripted teaching and direct instruction. The effect may be higher literacy and math competencies at an early age, but these initiative are also making children less inquisitive, less creative, less individualized, less confident, and less engaged in the long term. Another study out of Vanderbilt University took a look at how academically driven preschoolers, who participated in the Voluntary Pre-kindergarten program called TNVPK, compared to a control group of children that had gone through a more traditional preschool. The study revealed that by end of kindergarten, there were no longer any significant differences between the children from both groups. Over the following two years, the differences between the two groups became more noticeable: First grade teachers rated the TN-VPK children as less well prepared for school, having poorer work skills in the classrooms, and feeling more negative about school. In second grade, however, the groups began to diverge with the TN-VPK children scoring lower than the control children on most of the measures. The differences were significant on both achievement composite measures and on the math subtests. (Study:A Randomized Control Trial of a Statewide Voluntary Prekindergarten Program on Childrens Skills and Behaviors through Third Grade) A more intense focus on academics at an early age, repetitive teaching methods, and subjugation of children to the same insipid tasks year after year is killing their enthusiasm for learning. Too wrapped up in the hyper-competitive world, parents and educators are allowing for an environment that is putting undue stress and pressure on youngsters. According to Yale professor Edward Zigler, a leader in child-development and early education policy, what young children really need is more opportunities to use and hear complex language and a curriculum that includes social and emotional skills and active learning. Sources: Anna Huntis a staff writer forWakingTimes.comand an entrepreneur with over a decade of experience in research and editorial writing. She and her husband run a preparedness e-store outlet atwww.offgridoutpost.com, offering GMO-free storable food and emergency kits. Anna is also a certified Hatha yoga instructor. She enjoys raising her children and being a voice for optimal human health and wellness. Read more of her excellent articleshere. Visit her essential oils store here. Like Waking Times on Facebook. Follow Waking Times on Twitter. This article (The New Preschool System is Crushing Kids and Making Them Hate Learning) was originally created and published byWaking Timesand is published here under aCreative Commonslicense with attribution toAnna HuntandWakingTimes.com. It may be re-posted freely with proper attribution, author bio, and this copyright statement. Please contact WakingTimes@gmail.com for more info. Its just something to keep this busy until they reach their future as being government snitches. Heres the solution: remove your children from public school. Any parent sending their kids to gov. schools is a moron or an ultra liberal socialist. Home schooling or Christian school is the answer. This is not rocket science to any of you morons out there with kids in brainwashing centers. So you are implying that christian schools do not participate in that brainwashing charge? The state must declare the child to be the most This article proves without a shadow of a doubt that the parents of today do not care about THEIR own children. They are okay with big government controlling THEIR kids life. Parents nowadays are leading THEIR own kids into a life of TYRANNY. 