How do you feel about early childhood education?
By cynddvs
@cynddvs (2948)
United States
July 8, 2008 6:05pm CST
Where I live we have a really great early childhood education program called Birth to Kindergarten. This is a free program offered to parents by our county school system. You can enroll your child into this program as early as 1 month old and they get to stay in the program until they turn 5 years old. Once enrolled in the program a teacher comes to your house once a month to show parents how to become more effective teachers to their children. They do this by showing you very basic and simple activities based on your childs age and needs. Basically they are giving you an instruction manual for your child based on your families needs.
My daughter has been enrolled in this program since she was 1 year old. I have absolutely loved it! My daughter has grown very fond of her teacher and looks forward to her visits. I feel like my daughters teacher has taught us so much. My daughter is now 2 years old and can say the entire alphabet, count to 20, and knows all of her shapes and colors.
But we just found out a couple of weeks ago that this program may be getting cut in half. Our school system is having to make major cuts and this is one of the programs that is likely to be hit. Right now there are 650 families enrolled in the program and many more on a waiting list. They are looking to cut down to 325 families (noone knows who will be cut or how it will be decided). This is just very sad to me because this program has only been around for 3 years so it hasn't even been around long enough to show positive results yet. If they cut these families all of the research that has been put forth will be gone down the drain. And another bad thing is that the school board isn't even going to vote on it until July 21st. The teachers go back to work July 28th. Some of these teachers will have less than a weeks notice as to whether they will be keeping their jobs as is or be teaching elementary school again.
The teachers are very passionate about keeping the program around. They have even offered to use their own supplies and pay for their own gas (this really says a lot considering how much gas is and how much they have to drive).
I just really hope we are able to keep this program around. I think it will be worth it in the long run as kids will be going to Kindergarten more prepared and they won't have to pay as much for special education once in school.
How do you all feel about early childhood education? Do you have any programs like this where you live?
3 people like this
12 responses
@cobrateacher (8432)
• United States
9 Jul 08
I responded about 30 minutes ago, with a very long and detailed plan for dealing with these difficulties. A typo turned out to be a myLot no-no, so I fixed it. They wiped it out anyway. =(
Anyway, to go through all that in a greatly shortened version, a co-op could be created, with materials, supplies, a space, and teachers' pay being donated, all the parents taking their turns to spend full days helping our and making their little ones feel secure, etc. There could be clothing exchanges, toy exchanges, book exchanges, etc., and it works! These co-ops exist already, in many places. With more than 650 families involved, nobody would have to carry too great a load. The school system could surely fund an oversight committee to make sure educational goals are being met, rather than having to pay for the whole program.
2 people like this
@cynddvs (2948)
• United States
9 Jul 08
I'll have to look more into co-ops and see if that might be something we could do here. At this point I'm willing to do anything to try to keep this program alive. Thanks so much for the suggestion!
Sorry about the mylot mishap! That's so frustrating when that happens, especially with a well thought out response.
1 person likes this
@cobrateacher (8432)
• United States
9 Jul 08
I don't know where you live, but there are excellent working coops in many college towns throughout the country. Probably the best ones are in the San Mateo-Burlington area of California, or the suburbs of Boston.
I've always wished such a thing could work for the upper grades, since I teach high school seniors. Each of us teachers puts in untold hours and efforts trying to help the kids beyond what we do in class, but there could be so much more!
Best of luck! Loving psrents can do educational wonders!
1 person likes this
@Pirate_Arg (472)
• South Africa
9 Jul 08
I think it sounds like a great program but I can understand that the government can't support it completely. There should really be fees for the parents. That way the program can stay going, the teachers can be supported and (as it is in most things in life) the parents who think it matters enough to budget it in give their children an advantage (which also would stop people from just taking advantage of the service because it is free).
2 people like this
@cynddvs (2948)
• United States
9 Jul 08
That was actually one of the suggestions I made in one of my letters to the school board. I think that parents who can afford to pay a small fee for the program should do so if they are really concerned with staying in the program. And for those parents who can't afford it the program should still be free. Of course this would require pre screenings for the program. But like you said it might help weed out some of the people who might be taking advantage of the service because it's free (althought I don't think there are many parents out there that are blantantly taking advantage of the system like this).
1 person likes this
@mykmari_08 (2464)
• Philippines
9 Jul 08
Unfortunately, there's no early education program like this offerred in our country, if I'm not mistaken. I've got to admit that this is the first time I've heard of such program; but if it will be offerred locally and with the same terms as your program there, I guess I'd be much willing to avail of it and enroll my daughter there.
I've been married for more than five years now and our only child is turning three next month. With a very expensive cost of living, we are really finding it hard to make ends meet specially now that I'm the only one working for the whole family. My husband has no stable job and he's the one personally taking care of our daughter. We decided not to hire a nanny to minimize costs. We're still saving up for our child's future education, aside from paying off all our existing obligations from loans and credit card companies.
Anyway, it's so disheartening that they are planning to discontinue offerring this program to a lot of children. I hope that they will have a second thought on this as I know that it is helping not only children, but a lot of parents as well.
@ersmommy1 (12588)
• United States
9 Jul 08
Ours is called Parents as Teachers. As a matter of fact, I had my 1st prenatal visit today for my second child. It is a wonderful program. It has served my daughter well. She just aged out and will be starting kindergarten August 11. I think Early Ed. gives children a terrific start.
1 person likes this
@spalladino (17891)
• United States
9 Jul 08
That's so sad and I really hope that the program doesn't get cut. I know it's short notice but is it possible for the parents to get the word out to each other to write letters to the members of the school board in support of keeping the program's funding? Would your local newspaper or television news be interested in this issue? It doesn't hurt to make a call and find out.
I do support early childhood education. We didn't have anything as great as what you have when my kids were young but we did have something called Head Start that they could go to at age 4. My kids could not wait to be old enough to go and they loved it!
@cynddvs (2948)
• United States
9 Jul 08
I attended a meeting last Monday with the school board along with quite a few other parents. At the end of the meeting several moms got up to speak directly to the school board about the program. I found their stories very very touching. It just brought tears to my eyes how much this program has impacted these families.
I've also written emails and letters to the school board. And I also work for a local moms website so I have gotten the word out that everyone needs to voice their concerns for this program. Now all I can do is hope they listen.
Oh and we also have headstart here. But it's only for very low income families. The last time I checked I think the max income for a family of 3 was $12,000. While we won't qualify for a program like that it's good to know programs like that are out there for families that need it.
1 person likes this
@faln_angel1205 (1192)
• United States
9 Jul 08
Im absolutely in favor of E.C education. My son had a speech delay due to fluid in his ears, but the E.N.T specialist i first took him too missed that, so we were able to get him speech therapy through the E.C program with Easter Seals, and then when he started Preschool, the school district had a program for E.C for kids with developmental delays. Today my son is 5 and going into Kindergarten this fall, and is compltely caught up with his age developmentally and academically..without E.C program, this would not have been the case. I think that every single person across the globe should have access to such programs for their children.
1 person likes this
@carlaabt (3504)
• United States
9 Jul 08
I don't think there are any programs like that around here. At least if there are, I've never heard anything about them.
We have just started looking into preschools for our child, though. We won't send him until he's at least 3.5 (he's almost 2.5 now), and we will only send him 2-3 days a week for a few hours, so that he won't get tired of it. We do think preschool is important, though, since he doesn't have a whole lot of interaction with other kids right now.
1 person likes this
@wachit14 (3595)
• United States
9 Jul 08
As an educator, I love the idea of early childhood education. It makes the children better readers at an earlier age and since children have to be able to read and write in kindergarten, early childhood education is a great way to get them started. My own children both went to organized educational programs starting at a very early age. I took them to organized play groups which helped them develop both large and small motor skills and helped them learned to focus. I also took them to reading groups at the library.
Since I taught in a nursery school, they were both enrolled at two years old and by the time they were in kindergarten, they were both reading. I'm sorry to hear about what's happening in your school district. Unfortunately, these cuts are happening all over the country. I totally agree with you that these cuts are penny wise, and pound foolish as they will eventually end up costing the district more money in special services as those kids get older.
@faith210 (11224)
• Philippines
10 Jul 08
Hi cyndvvs! That is such a wonderful program and I hope it won't be cut down. I do think that the program will definitely yield positive and excellent results. We do have programs like that here in our area but they are not for free. However, the youngest that they accept are one year old toddlers and to be able to be accepted you have to have the money to pay. They charge very high and only the rich can afford such education/program. The children are not taught in the house but in school. The results are astonishing because a friend of mine whose daughter is enrolled in that school has developed a study/learning habits and is a high achiever.
Take care and God bless!
@lilybug (21107)
• United States
9 Jul 08
Ours is also called Parents as Teachers. My daughter started when she was 8 months old. The only complaint I have about it is that it is only during the school year. My daughter loves her teacher, but she is not going to be doing it next school year. After 9 years of teaching through PAT she is opening up a gymnastics studio in a nearby town. Melanie was always bringing me the lessons for a month ahead of my daughters age because she had already mastered all of the skills for her age level. I think that it is a great program. I wish it was around when my son was a baby. He could have really benefited from it.
@blackmantra_x (2732)
• Philippines
10 Jul 08
good day... It's a good thing your government has that kind of educational program at least you can see part of taxes your paying go to, it's just sad of the possibility of it being cut to half and the family that will be affected by it. My country being "poor" and all can't even offer a decent public elementary and high school programs, heck they can't even "afford" to build additional classrooms much less built new schools and the population really needs it. Education is a right of every individual and must be provided for free by every form of Government. Education serves as beacon to guide individuals go through their lives. It also serve as equalizing factor where in the rich and the poor are put in an equal plain field.
Children can start education as early as possible but not pushing it though so to avoid burn outs. I believe that your government's program if continue would bear tremendous results and the benefits would be reap by your children. good luck God bless.
@excellence7 (3655)
• Mauritius
9 Jul 08
Interesting.. I think it's a good idea..children must be educated since very early childhood itself. It makes them better prepared for better understanding the whole around them :)
1 person likes this
