A Sleight of Hand at the Elementary School Eliminates Kindergarten

The No Child Left Behind act apparently pressures our school system far more than it can handle.  Teachers all over have been desperate to bring on the appearance of competence among many of their students - students whom they just don't have the resources to teach properly with. And now, they are resorting to a new way to get children up to the levels of scholastic competence that the law requires. They are trying very hard to turn kindergarten into first grade in elementary school without telling anyone. They want more time with the children so that they may not fail so pathetically when they reach high school. So what are we talking about here?

More and more, states are starting to allow schools to take children who are as young as four years old into kindergarten. Most parents, who've been pushing their very young children to do well with all those flashcards and Dora the Explorer ever since they have been toddlers, are jumping at the chance to give their children a head start. They are glad to see that their children are going to get their minds molded at an earlier age than before.

And yet, some parents see how hard their children have it. They see that even if it's called kindergarten, what goes on in there looks pretty much like first grade. They see teachers pushing difficult lessons and training on their young children. There is no fingerpainting, there are no sand tables; instead, there are worksheets and homework. Young children who find it physically hard to hold a pencil or who find it impossible to sit there and concentrate on a new task for a long time are being forced to the breaking point. Teachers are desperate to get young children ready for standardized tests as early as third grade. They don't want to waste a minute. And so, elementary school today has become all about a no-kindergarten policy. Children go straight away to first grade even if everyone pretends it’s kindergarten.

But parents who see all of this and see what is being done to their children, sometimes choose to redshirts them. Redshirting is a term that's borrowed from sports. College athletes sometimes postpone the time they will enter competitive games. They try to give themselves more time to develop. Parents who wish to give their children more time to develop before the set them on the schooling treadmill, keep their children out of elementary school up until they are five or six sometimes.

It can seem terribly unfair to some that the cutoff age for when children become eligible to enter kindergarten for the first time can work in such a way that some children in any class will be a full year older than other children. These can be terribly important developmental years. A child who is 10 and in the same class with others who are 11, is going to feel a generation gap. A child who at 6 enjoys playing wargames is going to be terribly scary to a five-year-old who likes to sleep with his soft toy. Parents who redshirt their children want to give them the advantage that they don't have to ever be scared or be left out of any socializing circles. Sometimes, being a little slow can be better.

Back to School at 40

Should Secondary School Teachers Lose their Jobs after Poor Evaluations?

It's a scenario that plays out in hundreds of schools around the country every day - word reaches the school that one of the district’s teacher evaluators plans to show up soon and everyone had better be ready. Every primary and secondary school teacher knows that these evaluations don’t just end in a few harmless recommendations of what to do to improve things. If it's an underperforming school and the evaluator finds that the teacher is doing something wrong, she could actually stand to lose her job.

And they do. States like Washington have actually fired hundreds of teachers already based on the findings of teacher evaluators. It's all part of a hated new system called Impact that the teachers’ unions (understandably) oppose. The Race to the Top competition that President Obama has announced $5 billion for, has many states in the country taking up teacher evaluations like these to try to tighten their system up and improve their chances of making the grade.

As much as primary and secondary school teachers consider the system to be deeply unfair for placing all the burden of responsibility on them, the system does have its supporters. They feel that school districts across the country that have always lacked focus, that have never had any real teaching aims, that have always done without teaching standards, are suddenly greatly enabled by the establishment of these clear-cut standards and targets. The fact that teachers know that falling short will result in dismissal, they feel, is a great way to motivate them to do better.

Those who are appalled by the harshness of the new standards and the punishments dealt out feel that it is unbecoming of any established system that it should be more eager to throw people out of jobs than to help them attain the standards expected. If the system doesn't have a solution for a problem it picks up, how can it expect teachers to have one, they contend. Of course, the fact that the evaluation system just doesn't seem to sympathize with teachers who have to work against enormous odds in poor districts with poor budgets, and in crowded classrooms, does make sense. After all, teaching evaluators usually come away with excellent results for teachers in wealthy school districts and with poor grades for teachers in poor districts. The results do show that budget has a great deal to contribute to the success of a class; why fire the teachers for the failings of the budget, they wonder.

The Impact system is fairer  at times more than others though. It doesn't always depend on student test scores to grade primary and secondary school teachers. At times, it relies on classroom observations, where teachers are graded on how clearly they explain content and check for how well their students understand. It's only teachers who are completely and totally ineffective who are dismissed summarily. Even minimally effective teachers get a year to change.

However, as anyone who's been in a job knows, an evaluating boss can often be critical in a way that makes no sense. Teachers who get evaluated complain of arbitrary and petty evaluating techniques. That certainly is some truth to that.