The Globe’s Deirdre Fernandes looks at the debate over expanding kindergarten in Newton and Emily Norton shares her view in the TAB.
Should kindergarten in Newton be expanded?
by Village 14 | Sep 20, 2012 | Newton | 23 comments
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Good ideas don’t happen overnight, because change often takes years. When this good idea [full day kindergarten] finally happens in Newton [and it will], I hope people will remember we have Emily Norton to thank. Her sustained advocacy for this cause has been inspiring. She’s right, she knows it, and I’m sure she’s going to continue to fight for full day kindergarten until it becomes a reality. Thank you for all the hard work, Emily. You’re one of the best advocates our students have ever had.
Here, here. Couldn’t agree more. Well said, Mike and many thanks to Emily for her tireless advocacy on this issue.
So it seems like the motive is so that parents don’t have to pay for 1/2 days daycare. Much ado about nothing.
So what, people don’t want to raise their own kids anymore? I will forever be grateful that my mother only worked part time when we were growing up. My best friend barely seemed to know his parents. Maybe it’s because I don’t have kids yet, but I plan on either myself of my wife being their to raise them.
Mike
To be fair to Emily Norton et al., I think the FDK position is that it helps prepare children to be better readers and learners later on. To be fair to the NPS and the School Committee, they agree, but say that in order to do it right it will take a lot more money than is available to hire aides.
I think there is money. The K teachers are paid full time. We have no more dedicated Kindy Aides. Any aides in kindy are assigned to SPED kids, and those SPED aides already work two afternoons. Adding two more afternoons is not expensive (I don’t trust the numbers that were stated at the meeting. There is NO way that the AIDES by adding two afternoons per week cost $1.2M.
We need to provide proper time in school for our kids. Science is hardly taught in the elementary grades in Newton. If we want to provide our kids a healthy future, lets start when the kids are EAGER and READY to learn.
One woman at the school committee meeting shared her story from Korea, that her school had no plumbing, but they did have FDK.
Instead of cutting something already in place can we take another approach by offering tax rebates/subsidy to residents who enroll their kids in private full time programs? There would likely be sufficient participation to offer a nice rebate/subsidy. The negative is that we reduce the Newton program and city payroll. But is that really a negative if teachers migrate to the private sector? (I’m sure the union has an opinion)
Enough with the people who want to attack the education issue with time. Longer school days, longer school years and full day kindergarten. Let’s concentrate on doing better within the confines of time that we currently schedule.
The bottom line is it all costs more money and nobody wants to pay for it so it’s not going to happen. Even a blue city like Newton can’t get an override to pay for broken down school buildings. You think people are going to pay for more kindergarten? Not a chance.
@Hoss
Tax rebates for private kindy? Part of kindy is learning the school (usually a bigger building than preschool), more movement for the kids (gym, music, etc), and learning the school culure. Why have them transition twice? The kids follow the curriculum.
As someone who ended up not using the Newton schools, I completely disagree with Hoss about giving tax rebates. Yes, I paid for schools I didn’t use, but that’s part of being a citizen (and I say that as someone without much expendable income). There are lots of services I don’t use in Newton that I believe are important and need to be supported.
Thank you Mike & Lisap for your kind words! Yes I am going to keep at it, because this is the right thing to do for our kids. I also am skeptical of the $1.2M, and I am a bit bewildered as to why no one on the School Committee has pushed back on the superintendent about this number, and/or asked him to come up with other options. I agree with Newton Mom, there is no way that aides for a couple more afternoons a week would cost $1.2M. I suspect he is costing out aides for the entire day, all week. But what is the purpose of the aides? And do we need them all day? (We don’t have any K aides at all now, even though the full class of 18-24 kids is present every morning) Do they really need an aide during music, art, PE, lunch and recess? What would it cost to only have aides during literacy and math instruction? These are the kinds of questions the School Committee should be asking.
Music, art, PE, lunch and recess are the times when some kids are most in need of aides. There are kids (such as those on the autism spectrum or with ADHD) who have trouble with noisy settings or unstructured times.
@Emily, some children need their aides all day, especially during the noisy lunch/recess times. I think the superintendent is adding aides for all kindy. Yes, ideally, that is how to run a great program. But that is not being asked of the city. We, the citizens, are asking for the current program to be expanded. If the kids already do 2 long days with no aides, I don’t see why they HAVE to add full time aides all the time.
I agree with you. The $1.2M budget needs to be released. Real data would be helpful.
I don’t believe Emily is talking about Special Education aides when she talks about PE, etc. – she’s talking about the additional aides that NPS is saying are required for full-day. I get the argument about some additional aide support – right now, kids essentially get almost 5 hours of small group instruction with their teachers over their two long days, and that would disappear if we instituted full day without aides. But the 1.2 figure needs to be explained – is that for all-day aides, or just to replace the small-group afternoons?
@NewtonMom, I had three kids go through kindergarten in Newton, the first had half-day kindergarten and the other two (I think) both had the split schedule. (Two of them also had a K-1 class when they were in 1st grade, which we opted for primarily because of the teacher.) As I recall, only half the kids are in class during the afternoon at a time, which is why it can be done without additional classroom (i.e., not special education) aides. To expand to full day kindergarten across the board I assume aides would be needed to keep the ratios optimal in the afternoon. I had no complaints about either arrangement, because I think it worked well for all three of my kids, but I can see how having full day would help all kids prepare to learn and read in later years. (By the way, I often heard from other parents that full day would not work for their kids, because the day is just too long, with or without classroom aides.)
I hope Newton gets “full day” full day kindergarten, without charging parents extra, because I believe it will help students to be better learners and readers in later years. On the other hand, being married to a teacher who taught kindergarten in Newton and having had three kids go through kindergarten here myself, I want the schools to do it right and with the requisite support. My sincere hope is that NPS can find the money to do it right, not just do it for the sake of being able to say we have FDK.
Just to clarify, special education aides are there for the children with special needs who are on an individualized education plan (IEP). They are not there to work with the other kids in the class although as a practical matter, of course, having an extra adult in the classroom can be an asset. But parents should not expect or rely upon SpEd aides to supplement the teachers for regular education, particularly in kindergarten.
@Ted, well said and thanks for the input. Given me food for thought even though all my children are well past the K grade.
I’d like to address Kim’s comment, about “…people who want to attack the education issue with time. Longer school days, longer school years and full day kindergarten.”
Kim– I’m in complete agreement with you on the first two thirds of that argument. Kindergarten aside, longer school days and/or a longer school year are concepts I constantly rail against. I think they are both horrible ideas for a number of different reasons that I won’t get into here. I’d urge you however to look at full day kindergarten in a different light, as it would simply bring kindergarten into line with the rest of the grades in elementary school, and give students a much better start to the educational process that lays ahead of them. It’s never too early to start learning.
I would like to see full day kindergarten available as an option, but not required. As Ted said, many 5 year olds are just not ready developmentally to be in school all day. There are reasons that K was traditionally 1/2-day that have nothing to do with finances. Unfortunately, the past couple of decades have seen a push for kids to do academic tasks at younger and younger ages, to the point of being developmentally inappropriate for many of them.
@Ted – there are no aides at all. Why would there need to be any classroom (non SPED) aides if full time? Plus right now the kindy kids have their music, art and gym in the morning. Studies have shown these children are early risers, and could learn their academics in the morning, and leave the PE, music and art for the afternoon. Just an idea.
My kids are out of kindy (first grade and fifth grade). But I believe in a full day kindy program.
Newton Mom, just wondering, have you ever been a kindergarten teacher?
I taught kindergarten for 12 years in three communities with several different schedules (half day, double session, 3/4 day, K-1), and the one schedule I see as detrimental to young children is a full day program that’s inadequately staffed. Five year old children are too young to spend six and a half hours with a 1:22 student/teacher ratio. They need more adult attention to ensure their emotional, social, and academic growth.
@MGWA, in Massachusetts you are not required by law to send your child to school until they are six. If a parent believes their child is not ready for a full day they are absolutely free to keep their child in a private program that meets their needs or keep them at home.
However, with the coming Common Core standards which are more rigorous, and the need for every child to be reading proficiently by third grade, full day K is important. We still have 20% of third graders in Newton who do not read proficiently. In one of our elementary schools that number is as high as 36%. According to the National Literacy Panel, 75% of students who do not read proficiently by third grade will continue to struggle in school through high school.
Margaret – Why should a tax payer have to pay for private K when public is available? I didn’t say we shouldn’t have full day K, just that the full day component should be optional. It isn’t that difficult to arrange the day so that missing the afternoon isn’t detrimental, and making it optional will also reduce the teacher: student ratio in the afternoon, when the kids are tired.