Are We Pushing Our Kids Too Hard?
When my daughter started kindergarten six years ago I was quite dismayed to learn that she had homework to complete every week. Homework? In kindergarten? When I was growing up I didn't have homework until I went to high school.
My daughter is now in fifth grade and all that homework doesn't seem to have done her any harm - other than the fact that she has learned to think that reading after school is work instead of something you do for fun - but I have to wonder if we are making a mistake pushing our kids so hard instead of giving them time to just be kids.
Apparently a group called Alliance for Childhood agrees with me. Alliance for Childhood, which bills itself as a childhood advocacy group, recently sent out a press release regarding a new trend of giving kindergartners monthly standardized tests. In a new report released on March 20 entitled "Crisis in the Kindergarten: Why Children Need to Play in School," the authors Edward Miller and Joan Almon say that kindergarten testing is "out of control."
Testing and test preparation in kindergarten is spreading, says the report, with teachers increasingly using test scores to make decisions about promotion, retention and placement in gifted programs. This testing, according to Alliance for Childhood, does not make sense. "Standardized testing of children under age eight, when used to make significant decisions about the child's education, is in direct conflict with the professional standards of every educational testing organization."
"A major problem with kindergarten tests is that relatively few meet acceptable standards of reliability and validity," says the National Association for the Education of Young Children. "The probability of a child being misplaced is fifty percent - the same odds as flipping a coin. ...Flawed results lead to flawed decisions, wasted tax dollars, and misdiagnosed children."
The National Association of School Psychologists agrees, stating that "evidence from research and practice in early childhood assessment indicates that issues of technical adequacy are more difficult to address with young children who have little test-taking experience, short attention spans, and whose development is rapid and variable."
The report further points out that, although children given standardized tests may experience early gains in first and second grade, by the time they reach the fourth grade these gains have faded and children who attended play-based kindergartens excel over others in reading, math, social and emotional learning, creativity, oral expression, industriousness and imagination.
My own question about testing, homework and generally pushing our kids so hard at a young age is this: at what cost are we doing this? How many kids are going to grow up anxious and depressed because they were not developmentally ready to be pushed so hard? Or because they were inaccurately pigeon-holed based upon an unreliable test score? I agree with Alliance for Children that kids need time to just be kids.
I could not agree more! My daughter currently in grade 9 really struggled with school. Her ambitions are to be a pro golfer and school caused her to be distracted and distressed due to the amount of homework, projects etc. leaving her no time what so ever to practice her golf. This year we are home schooling her and her life has changed drastically. She works from 8 am to 13hoo on school work and the rest of the day is spent on golf. Her grades have never been this good and her golf is just brilliant. Her whole persona has changed and she is lively and positive about life as she used to be. Rob South Africa
I find the opposite to be true for several reasons. Children are encoraged to play while at school during recess, school trips, and while at home with parent’s. However, in the United States we focus so much on not educating our children to certain standards due to being afraid of stressing them out. In reality it takes hard work and determination to become good at anything you do. I have seen a trend in children who know more about video games than spelling and math. However, when other nations excel more than the U.S. In academics we question the reason why. We should be helping our teachers while our children are in school, and not complain about the “abundance” of work. Then we wonder why we have a shortage of doctors, and nurses.
I am a little upset with our schools in these days because when I was in kindergarten they taught us our abc’s and 123’s. Kids just need to be kids and have fun while they are so young instead of making them grow up before they should when they are in their teens. Also they do not need to know about sex until they are in junior highschool or highschool. I think that is why kids are having kids at such a young age.
We need not to rush our children into the adult life at such an early age. While they are young we need to show them that they are loved. And like I said earlier let kids just be kids and have alot of fun in the childhood ages.
I agree with Mindy. We need to let kids grow the way they are supposed to grow and that includes letting them be children in the early grades to develope interactions with other children. I think we in the USA have become so obsessed with keeping up with other nations on the academic track that we are destroying our children in the process. Look at the rate of teen suicide and drug use today.Children cannot deal with the amount of stress that they are subjected to at such an early age.Let them be kids!
I believe kindergarten is too young to have homework.Let kids be kids!
it’s things like this that make me not want to have kids.
i remember getting homework in first grade and i was wondering why we had to do schoolwork at home.
i think i also got some in kindergarten but i didn’t realize that i had to bring it back to class the next day.
I’m with Mindy. Not only are children being pushed too early academically, but socially. Honestly, kindergartners wearing low slung jeans and belly shirts and earrings and all that goes with that….too much, too young. I don’t think we can go back though. Today’s young parents are products of that same way of thinking. Maybe I am an old fuddy duddy, but playing with paper dolls and coloring books and riding bikes was more fun to me than being hooked up to an electronic gadget all day. Bless these kids, I feel for them.
I think it all depends on the child. Some children are ok to do all the homework, and others need more time to learn everything. I understand that the school systems just want all the children to be the same, they’d love them all to learn the same and to all act the same. They want a perfect classroom.
I have a three year old little boy and I already have “anxiety” about what he may mostly like be up against because of everything I see with the stress placed on kindergartners and early grade school students. This is rediculous. Sometimes I wonder if a great deal of the stress is created by parents as well due to the constant competition there seems to be out there with children.
i don’t believe that the kids today are being pushed too hard. kids should be able to be kids but they also have to start learning fundamentals early. it is ideal that the moral learning be left to the parents/family and their support network (extended family, church, neighborhood). learning how to write your name and other letters/numbers, the abc’s, 123’s, colors, shapes, space, etc. those are important to learn. those need to be learned before going into the 1st grade. there are a lot of children out there who do not know this. instead, they may know how to get to level 3 on their xbox 360 or watch hannah montana on tv or play with bratz dolls. the fundamentals of being a child 20-30+years ago have drastically changed with the lifestyle and technological advances of our time. I see kids having cell phones….wait, not just cell phones but PDAs with texting capabilities, internet access and myspace pages. and i am not talking about teenagers in high school…some are a lot younger than that. a lot of these kids can master handling certain electronic gadgets or keyboard but cannot master a pencil and paper. is that what we refer to as being ‘kids’ or is it something that we remember our youth being.
I couldn’t agree more. I am still at school with loads more years ahead of me if I want to be a teacher (which i do) and i seem to have at least 4 hours of homework every night, and I havent even started me GCSEs yet! Im always stressed, frustrated and depressed! I never get home till 5pm, so you do the math of how long homework takes me. It seems like school doesn’t want us to have fun or a social life! Most of the time the homework me and my class get ends up not being needed, and besides, if the work needs doing, shouldn’t there be time allocated for it in lessons? My school also has no lockers, so i have to carry in excess of a stone in weight on my back every day, i’m 13 and already experiencing back problems! (BTW I’m british, we start school at 4 and GCSE courses are taken between the ages of 14 and 16)
Kids are not working too hard. In other countries, 1st graders are learning multiplication. We are behind.
My daughter started kindergarten this year, and I have to say that we are not only pushing too hard but relay too much on tests. the 2nd week of school the kids (5 years old mind you) were given a test to determine if they qualify for a special program for kis that are “behind”. My daughter is by no means “behind” (she knows some sight words, can do simple addition and tell can you what letter a word starts with) but she did not test well so the teacher wants her placed in the program. She also said that she is easly distracted and wants to get her help with attention issues….I tried to explain that she has been home with me this is all new and a shock to her give her time to adjust, she brushed it off as not being the issue. Children mature at different speeds and trying to lump them into one grouping will not work. However, if your kid is not keeping up with what the education system considers normal then they are ship the off to a special class to be labeled for life, and trying to start the lable process 2nd week into kindergaten is unacceptable.
My daughter is five and started kindergarten this year. They tested my daughter this week and now they wan’t her to attend full day instead of half-day because she is “behind”. I can’t believe the pressure their putting on my child I will not let them push their communist curriculum down my childs throat. I will fight this tooth and nail and expect every red blooded American with children in school to do the same. Its time to take the parental power back!!!