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Tutors and test prep for preschoolers?
An article in the Chicago Tribune last week outlines the growing practice of preschoolers cramming with tutors for entry into the top public schools in the city.
It’s a practice that cities like New York know well, but it’s new and growing in Chicago and other increasingly competitive school systems in the country.
In Chicago, 3,337 applications have been filed this year for 500 seats in Chicago Public School system’s classical and gifted kindergarten programs for this fall. As the Tribune says:
“..with low-performing neighborhood schools an unattractive option and the cost of some private schools out of reach, many parents see CPS’ selective enrollment programs as the best public education option in the city.”
Is a preschool tutor a good idea?
Here’s what testing includes: Continue reading »
Which skills do kids get from preschool?
This week, child development researchers from the University of Michigan reported on the benefits of preschool. They say two years of a formal program before kindergarten is important, especially for certain skills.
The study, published in Early Childhood Research Quarterly, followed three and four-year-old kids and assessed their skill levels in the areas of self-regulation, vocabulary, and letter knowledge.
According to the researchers, only 57 percent of three to five-year olds attend preschool. And “as many as half of students enter kindergarten without the necessary academic or social skills needed to succeed.”
Here are the skills the got a boost with two years of preschool: Continue reading »
Parents who want their toddlers to get into ultra-competitive private schools in Manhattan are hiring private tutors to coach their 4-year-olds on the admissions exam, according to The New York Times. But are they helping or hindering them?
Because so many kids are being prepped for the test, it is no longer an accurate measure of children’s abilities. Now most of these private schools no longer value the Early Childhood Admissions Assessment (known as the E.R.B. after the Educational Records Bureau, the company that administers it).
But, aside from test results, is spending money on a private tutor for your preschooler beneficial in the long run? Continue reading »
Back when I was a kid, it seemed as if all my friends’ moms were addicted to soap operas. Today’s moms are more likely to have the TV tuned to kiddie shows — which is why it’s not such a surprise to hear that The Walt Disney Company will eliminate its SoapNet cable channel and replace it with a new network targeted to preschoolers.
Since it aired soap opera reruns, the 10-year-old SoapNet has been relatively cheap for Disney to operate. But, as Nickelodeon has discovered with Nick Jr. (formerly Noggin), preschool television programming is big business.
The new commercial-free channel will be called Disney Junior, which some critics say emulates Nickelodeon’s Nick Jr. Continue reading »
In the past, most pediatricians discouraged swimming lessons for little kids because it really wasn’t clear whether or not preschoolers, toddlers, and babies were developmentally up to the task. Not only that, they feared, the lessons could give parents a false sense of security around pools and other bodies of water.
But new research suggests that kids between the ages of one and four do benefit from swimming lessons, and now the American Academy of Pediatrics is recommending that families put their tots into swim school.
My daughter, circa 18-months, watching Curious George.
I’ll never forget the poignancy of what she said. I had just turned off the television when my daughter, red in the face, stomping her feet and punching her fists in the air, shouted, “Maybe they should have never invented TVs!” She choked back a few breaths and said, “I wish Grandma was born a million years ago so we never had to watch TV,” and then collapsed into my arms and sobbed. I knew exactly what she meant. The paradox of childhood is that despite having very little life experience, kids seem to intrinsically understand things, as if they have all the secrets of life tucked inside their little sleeves, just waiting for the right moment to teach us something really important. Like, sometimes things that are meant to make us happy can make us resentful and angry if we get in too deep.
Which is to say, for the umpteenth time, if kids watch excessive amounts of TV, it will ruin their lives. Parents know this. But a new study released yesterday in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine reiterates that toddlers who watch too much TV will end up doing poorly in school.
University of Montreal and University of Michigan researchers found that “each additional hour of TV that children watched at 29 months corresponded with a 7% decrease in classroom engagement, a 6% drop in math achievement, a 13% decrease in physical activity on weekends, a 10% increase in video-game playing and a 10% greater likelihood of getting teased, assaulted or insulted by classmates” by age 10. According to the study, television consumes nine hours of the average 2-and-a-half-year-old’s week, increasing to 15 hours by age four-and-a-half. (I admit, my four-and-a-half year old watches 15 hours of TV a week. Does this mean I can check off a milestone on her development chart?) Purportedly kids with “educated mothers watched less; those from single-parent homes watched more.” I’m an educated single-parent, so I guess it all evens out in the wash.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends parents watch TV with their children and discuss program content with them. Because I’m a modern/neurotic/dedicated parent and I want my kid to have a trouble-free life, I did that for a long time. It was easier when I was married. But I still tried as a single mom. Until the syrupy-sweet voices of the cast of Clifford began to lull me to sleep on the couch. And I realized I could actually get some work done while my daughter watched her morning shows. So for the past few months, I’ve let PBS babysit my kid for two hours a day. That automatically means she’s gonna be a failure by age 10? I don’t think so. Continue reading »
There will come a time in your child’s life when their friends’ influence will rival your own, but a new study suggests that when looking for role models, young kids look to their parents.
Lori Garcia 
Joslyn Gray 
Amber Doty 
Julianna Miner 
Monica Bielanko 
Sierra Black 
Meredith Carroll 
Carolyn Castiglia 
Sunny Chanel 
Madeline Holler 
Rebecca Odes 
Danielle Smith 
Danielle Sullivan 
Katherine Stone 
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