\u201cThe changes to kindergarten make me sick,\u201d a veteran teacher in Arkansas recently admitted to me. \u201cThink about what you did in first grade\u2014that\u2019s what my 5-year-old babies are expected to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
The difference between first grade and kindergarten may not seem like much, but what I remember about my first-grade experience in the mid-90s doesn\u2019t match the kindergarten she described in her email: three and a half hours of daily literacy instruction, an hour and a half of daily math instruction, 20 minutes of daily \u201cphysical activity time\u201d (officially banned from being called \u201crecess\u201d) and two 56-question standardized tests in literacy and math\u2014on the fourth week of school.<\/p>\n
That American friend\u2014who teaches 20 students without an aide\u2014has fought to integrate 30 minutes of \u201cstation time\u201d into the literacy block, which includes \u00a0\u201cblocks, science, magnetic letters, play dough with letter stamps to practice words, books, and storytelling.\u201d But the most controversial area of her classroom isn\u2019t the blocks nor the stamps: Rather, it\u2019s the \u201chouse station with dolls and toy food\u201d\u2014items her district tried to remove last year. The implication was clear: There\u2019s no time for play in kindergarten anymore.<\/p>\n
A working paper,\u00a0\u201cIs Kindergarten the New First Grade?,\u201d\u00a0<\/a>confirms what many experts have suspected for years: The American kindergarten experience has become much more academic\u2014and at the expense of play. The late psychologist, Bruno Bettelheim, even raised the concern in\u00a0an article for\u00a0The Atlantic<\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/em>in 1987.<\/p>\n Researchers at the University of Virginia, led by the education-policy researcher Daphna Bassok, analyzed survey responses from American kindergarten teachers between 1998 and 2010. \u201cAlmost every dimension that we examined,\u201d noted Bassok, \u201chad major shifts over this period towards a heightened focus on academics, and particularly a heightened focus on literacy, and within literacy, a focus on more advanced skills than what had been taught before.\u201d<\/p>\n In the study, the percentage of kindergarten teachers who reported that they agreed (or strongly agreed) that children should learn to read in kindergarten greatly increased from 30 percent in 1998 to 80 percent in 2010.<\/p>\n Bassok and her colleagues found that while time spent on literacy in American kindergarten classrooms went up, time spent on arts, music, and child-selected activities (like station time) significantly dropped. Teacher-directed instruction also increased, revealing what Bassok described as \u201cstriking increases in the use of textbooks and worksheets\u2026 and very large increases in the use of assessments.\u201d<\/p>\n But Finland\u2014a Nordic nation of 5.5 million people,\u00a0where I\u2019ve lived and taught fifth and sixth graders over the last two years<\/a>\u2014appears to be on the other end of the kindergarten spectrum. Before moving to Helsinki, I had heard that most Finnish children start compulsory, government-paid kindergarten\u2014or what Finns call \u201cpreschool\u201d\u2014at age 6. And not only that, but I learned through my Finnish mother-in-law\u2014a preschool teacher\u2014that Finland\u2019s kindergartners spend a sizable chunk of each day playing, not filling out worksheets.<\/p>\n Finnish schools have received substantial\u00a0media attention<\/a>\u00a0for years now\u2014largely because of\u00a0the consistently strong performance of its 15-year-olds on international tests like the PISA<\/a>. But I haven\u2019t seen much coverage on Finland\u2019s youngest students.<\/p>\n So, a month ago, I scheduled a visit to a Finnish public kindergarten\u2014where a typical school day is just four hours long.<\/p>\n