“Babysitting” in ‘Bama?
Alabama Gov. Bob Riley last week told the Huntsville Times that he’d ask the state legislature to expand state-funded preschool. The state’s department of education estimated the cost at $120 million. Although Alabama is a right to work state with no collective bargaining law, the Alabama Education Association represents the interests of teachers in the [...]
Renowned Early Childhood Scholar Passes
Leslie R. Williams, a Teachers College faculty member who made a long list of contributions to the field of early childhood education, died over the Thanksgiving holiday. Professor Williams had been a Head Start teacher and trainer for tribal programs in South Dakota, founded the Rita Gold Center, which is a day-care and pre-kindergarten lab [...]
Texting Toddlers
I took note earlier this month of the intense focus of toy makers on making toys educational, to lure in parents who are predisposed to think the hunt for the best college begins in the womb. Latest entry on this theme is the story in the New York Times this morning on digital toys for [...]
State pre-k News
State pre-kindergarten news: Virginia’s Democratic governor, Timothy Kaine, gained a majority in the state Senate but the Republicans still hold an edge in the House. Makes his work to expand spending on pre-k, despite state budget troubles, more difficult. Michigan’s budget woes may slow growth of pre-k enrollments there. California’s staring at a $10 billion [...]
Newsweek on Growth in Pre-K
Newsweek’s Nov. 12 edition has a short piece on the growth in preschool enrollments in both public and private settings, pegged to the release of a new report on participation data due out from the National Institute of Early Education Research. (on the web here. According to the article, NIEER says 69% of 4 year [...]
More “Sandbox” on New American Media
New American Media, the California non-profit collaboration that provides news and commentary to ethnic-focused media and offers various services to help those outlets make money, has a Q&A with David Kirp, author of the pro-Universal Pre-Kindergarten book “The Sandbox Investment.” The questioner mostly asks good questions but the premise of one is questionable. The questioner [...]
A Lesson Plan for Infants (This WILL be on the test!)
I was struck this past weekend by the number of television ads for toys aimed toddlers. Christmas selling and buying season starts right after Halloween. The ads caught my ear because they were talking about how babies develop skills with the right toys. A couple of days ago I Googled eBeanstalk, the company whose ads [...]
Making Pre-Ks Accountable: Is NCLB for Tots the Answer?
Determining whether pre-kindergarten or Head Start or other programs are serving their children well and helping them to develop socially, emotionally, and cognitively is fraught with challenges. Obviously, testing kids by asking them to read and bubble in the answers is silly. To wrestle with this issue, the Pew Charitable Trusts (full disclosure, a financial [...]
Kirp Speaks About “The Sandbox Investment”
David L. Kirp, author of “The Sandbox Investment,” a new book about the pre-school movement and what he calls “kids-first politics,” gave the Virginia and Leonard Marx lecture last night at Teachers College. David is a UC Berkeley public policy professor but also has been a newspaper editorial writer. So, while he backs up what [...]
Airing Their Views on WBUR: Besharov, Brooks-Gunn, Kirp
I was invited by the producers of the show On Point at WBUR in Boston to “set the table” as it were, for a discussion of pre-kindergarten, universal pre-kindergarten, politics, child care and other topics with Doug Besharov of the American Enterprise Institute, Jeanne Brooks-Gunn of Teachers College and
