Pre-K Alignment with K-12 Common Standards Update

by Susan Gunnewig Posted on: June 18, 2010 at 11:24 AM

Last week, I shared with you the news concerning the U.S. Department of Ed.’s release of the K-12 Common Standards for Reading and Math. These standards are to play a major role in Obama’s administration for education reform. The Department of Education has already tied federal money to states embracing the common standards. States vying for the Race to the Top program, for example, received 40 points (out of a possible 500) for participating in the consortium and taking steps to adopt the standards. The Council for Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and the National Governor’s Association (NGA) lead the formation of the K-12 standards. It has been announced that CCSSO and NGA will soon be starting on a set of standards for birth to 5 years old and would align with the K-12 ones. Hopefully, the new findings from the National Early Literacy Panel (NELP) and the National Research Council’s Early Math report will be a source for constructing these very important standards for Pre-K.

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Tags: k-12, common standards, obama

Category: Department of Education | Funding | Literacy | Mathematics

Math Experience in Many Pre-K Classrooms Almost Non-Existent

by Susan Gunnewig Posted on: February 12, 2010 at 10:30 AM

As we reported in late July, the National Research Council introduced a rigorous study into early childhood mathematics to the nation. This report entitled, Mathematics Learning in Early Childhood, presents a sobering look at math instruction or the lack of math instruction in early childhood. Some of the committee members who wrote this report participated in a February 1, 2010 event on Capitol Hill. Dr. Doug Clements, Dr. Heidi Schweingruber and Henry Kepner explained some of the findings. “According to the study, 60 percent of 3 year-olds receive no math instruction at all, even though young children can be very competent with certain math concepts at an early age. Children in low-socioeconomic (SES) backgrounds are more vulnerable because they receive less exposure to math from parents at home.

Alice Starkey and Prentice Klein from the University of California, Berkeley have informed the nation through their rigorous studies that preschool children in a program receive about 3 minutes per day on average vs. their peers in China who receive 30 minutes per day. In the Starkey/Klein study they looked at programs in both countries who served children from low SES.

I am pleased that early childhood mathematics is receiving national attention!

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