It's time for an Education Revolution

For many years I've felt that public education is failing our children. I work in public education, in what I believe is our greatest hope for change...Pre-K.  Suddenly, for the first time policy makers and decision makers are seeing the importance of quality early childhood education. I will be the first to agree, and have advocated for early childhood education in Hartford, CT and in DC. But I am leery that administrators and policy makers will force their agenda, curriculum/standards & expectations down upon Pre-School rather than allowing Early Childhood Educators to lead and push our developmentally appropriate curriculum up into K-3 where it would do the most good. People who argue that early childhood education doesn't matter because it all levels out in 3rd grade are partially right..because the good work we do in pre-k is undone by forcing young students to sit in desks, wait in lines, perform paper and pencil tasks and completely stifle their youthful exuberance, playfulness and joy in K-3. It doesn't matter how early a child learns to read, but that he does, and that she understands what she is reading and has schema to draw upon from life experiences to  make connections.

There is so much emphasis on assessment, testing, reading by kindergarten...that we have lost sight of the whole child. Children are naturally curious, and learn more through exploring, questioning, wondering, creating and imagining, than by any paper and pencil lesson or assessment. Kindergarten students are working hard all day with very little time to play...yes, play.  Play...or if you prefer...experiential learning is what children do, it's how they process new information, it's what forms pathways in their brains and builds schema, higher order thinking skills, collaboration (social) skills, and communication skills (language!).

We speak of the achievement gap, the need to close the word gap and promote literacy and language skills, then we put 20-28 students in a classroom and tell them not to talk. "Don't talk, don't touch anything, don't ask questions, don't touch any one, just...don't."  We are stifling the creativity, brain and language development and gross motor skills of our country's youth.  Instead of teaching them they are capable, we tell them ( in our words, attitudes and actions) that they aren't, as we expect every child to learn the same thing at the same pace, in the same way, without considering each child's aptitudes and interests. In pre-k we focus on child interests, and individualize instruction based on each student's strengths and needs. When did teaching become about competition and tricking students by giving them several possible answers to choose from that may be an answer but not the best answer? Or give simple examples in class then test them on a more difficult problem with a twist?  When did AP US History become reading 500 pages a week and answering 300 multiple choice questions each Friday? Where is the deeper learning? The Critical thinking?

We are failing our kids, our students...our future leaders, entrepreneurs and workers of this country. The more I learn in our coursework at UNH in IT&DML, the more passionate I become about changing what is broken: Our schools. Please take the time to watch these four relatively short but very powerful videos, selected from about 40 I've watched this year. Please view them, share them, talk about them, blog about them, and get get policy makers, decision makers, administrators and teachers to take notice.  We are holding our kids back. We are.  It's time to let them shine.

Sir Ken Robinson, Tony Wagner, Heidi Hayes Jacobs and Marc-Andre Lalande are passionate about changing the education system. I am too...will you join us? Click on the link to view their videos.

• Tony Wagner: Reinventing Education for the 21st Century (Pay special attention to Wagner at 11:25, 14:09 and 14:55 and his thoughts on Common Core and College acceptance practices)
• Marc-Andre Lalande Failing Superman:
• Sir Ken Robinson: How to Escape Education's Death Valley
• Heidi Hayes Jacobs: 21st Century Teaching & Learning within the Common Core

I'd love to discuss your thoughts after watching these videos. Are you on board? Who will you share
these with? How do you think we can affect change?