Kindergarten `reform' won't fix things
Ontario's `back-to-basics' plan ignores underlying issues, says
Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce recently announced that the Ontario government plans to bring “back-to-basics” teaching of reading, writing and math into kindergarten.
For shame!
True, Ontario's current play-based model in kindergarten has not proved successful. Change is needed. However, instead of basing this change on the root causes of students being unprepared for Grade 1, our government latches on to a quick-fix strategy based on headline-grabbing buzz words (“back to basics”) and the simplistic notion that “it was better before.”
Yes, it was better before. Thirty years ago, kindergarten and junior kindergarten classes typically had 14 students. If a 15th student was added, an educational assistant was assigned, and the class size was capped.
Today, this same classroom might now house twice that number. The increased class size is justified by having two teachers in the classroom, yet the reality remains. Thirty children, as young as three, at diverse developmental stages, and some with undisclosed behavioural issues, are warehoused all daylong in a classroom built for 15 students.
The result is needy, noisy children seeking attention through voluntary or involuntary extreme behaviours. Those who are less likely to demonstrate extreme behaviours begin to emulate those who do because they are, after all, only three, four or five years old and in need of attention.
Exacerbating the problem? Principals are increasingly inaccessible, administration assistants overworked, and educational assistants threatened with burnout.
Yes it was better before. Twenty years ago a kindergarten or early years program was still a shorter day — not full day every day.
This shorter day recognized the needs of a young child, many still needing a nap, and addressed their inability initially to sustain focus all day.
Yes it was better before. Fifteen years ago, there was still an option to have separate Junior and Senior Kindergarten classes.
Our most vulnerable students, three to five year olds, were given the opportunity to begin school with the focus on self-regulation and exploration in Junior Kindergarten.
In Senior Kindergarten, they were ready for a greater emphasis on numeracy and literacy skills.
The government's solution “back to basics” solution does not address the real causes of unsuccessful learners entering Grade 1: too many students, too many diverse needs, too little space, too little support for staff, and a too-demanding full-day curriculum. The government's solution does address, though, a political agenda of underfunding early learning programs (and implicitly fostering “teacher bashing” for the discouraging, inevitable results).
If only our education system would recognize that money invested in our youngest, most vulnerable students would save the huge expenses of trying to fix deeply embedded learning deficits in the older grades.
Shame on that system for attempting to deceive us all with quick-fix strategies while the early years learning programs are imploding.
Gwen Flaherty is a retired kindergarten teacher with the Waterloo Catholic District School Board. She taught half-day mornings and afternoons, full-day every other day and finally full-day every day kindergarten programs while raising three children also going through the education system.