Testing the life out of pre-schoolers

Geralyn Bywater McLaughlin, Nancy Carlsson-Paige, and Diane E. Levin, Voices From the Field - A disturbing shift is underway in early childhood classrooms around the country. Many classrooms, especially those that depend on public funds, look more and more like classrooms for older children where standards, testing, and accountability rule. Federal and state mandates are pushing academic skills and testing down to younger children, even preschoolers. These days, there is less and less emphasis on promoting child development, active, play-based learning, and hands-on exploration for our nation’s youngest learners.

At our nonprofit project, Defending the Early Years, we launched an online survey to find out what teachers think about how current education mandates are affecting their classrooms, their teaching, and children’s learning. Over the course of the 2012-2013 school year, 185 early childhood classroom teachers (Pre-K – 3rd Grade) from across 31 states voluntarily came to our website to document their experiences. Overwhelmingly, these teachers reported that recent policy changes have hindered — not helped — their young students. Although they don’t represent a randomly selected group, these teachers are from a variety of early childhood settings including public and private schools, Head Start classrooms, and center-based preschools who took their own time to share their experiences and stories with DEY. A large majority of the teachers completing this survey say that playful learning is disappearing from their classrooms, and that developmentally inappropriate activities and assessments are now at the forefront of daily classroom life. Teachers in public schools expressed the most concern.



One of the survey items asked teachers to respond to this statement: “My students have adequate time to play and explore at school.” Forty-nine percent of all teachers responding said, “No.” But of those teaching in public school settings, 69 percent responded, “No.” Play is the primary way that young children make sense of the world around them, learn new ideas and skills, develop creative thinking and problem-solving skills, and deal with stress. Furthermore, what is learned through play provides an essential foundation for later academic learning. Early childhood teachers are trained to promote the optimal development and learning of young children through play.

And according to this survey, half of teachers — and more than two-thirds of those in public schools — feel they are now unable to do so. Many teachers in the survey commented about their struggles to keep play at the center of the curriculum, despite the pressure they feel to teach specific skills and adhere to scripted curricula. A public school kindergarten teacher from Maine wrote:

When teachers in my district bring this [need for play] to the attention of administrators for discussion, we ‘get our hands slapped’. After thirty-plus years of teaching, I am currently working at least twelve-hour days in an attempt to plan in such a way that I can provide time for my students to have opportunities for play and exploration as well as the lessons I am mandated to teach. Every day staff members comment on how they can’t do this much longer, as it goes against every belief we have in teaching young children.

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