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Monica
Mendoza, The Arizona Republic, October 10, 2004
In the weeks leading to the start of school in August, Glendale school
Principal Rick Alvarez worked fast to convert two empty sixth-grade
classrooms into kindergarten classrooms.
Everything had to be smaller, blackboards and book bag hooks had to be
lowered, and furniture for little people needed to replace the larger
student desks. Harold W. Smith Elementary School was among the 136 schools
in the state that qualified for money to run full-day kindergarten
classes. Alvarez was not going to miss the chance, he said. At his school,
94 percent of the children qualify for free or reduced-price lunch and 60
percent are learning English. Most of the children in kindergarten come to
his school without ever having held a book, a pencil or a crayon, Alvarez
said.
"Think of it like all children are meeting at the starting line for a
race," Alvarez said. "Our kids are still running to get to the starting
line." advertisement
In May, Arizona lawmakers approved a state budget that spends $25 million
this school year on full-day kindergarten programs in the state's poorest
neighborhoods. The money goes to schools where at least 90 percent of the
children qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.
Gov. Janet Napolitano wants to expand the program over the next five years
until every school offers all-day kindergarten, at an estimated budget of
$200 million. It's part of her early education initiative that includes
proposals to rate child-care centers, provide incentives to child-care
centers and teachers, and increase children's access to health care.
Across the country, lawmakers are talking about their state's youngest
pupils, some debating funding for full-day kindergarten programs, some
talking about state-funded preschool programs. The Early Childhood
Longitudinal Study by the National Center for Education Statistics shows
full-day kindergarten gaining steam. About half of the public schools in
the country offer at least one full-day kindergarten class, up from 20
percent in the 1970s, according to the study.
In Arizona, about 44 percent of all 5-year-olds are enrolled in full-day
kindergarten classes. Some school districts offer the full-day program for
a fee; others have used voter-approved tax money to run full-day programs.
Full-day kindergarten is expected to be among the top issues in the next
legislative session. On one side is a group of lawmakers who say the cost
is too high and benefits have not been proven. On the other side are
lawmakers who say early education is the key to success for many of
Arizona's students who struggle in later years.
At Smith school, teachers had been asking for full-day kindergarten for
years, Alvarez said. The 2½ hours a day in the half-day program was not
enough time.
"We have to catch them up, and we don't have a lot of time," Alvarez said.
Kindergarten standards
Kindergartners in Arizona have a list of learning goals, called state
standards, which they must learn by the end of the school year. There are
skills in the arts, social studies, technology, health, and reading and
writing that all kindergartners are expected to master.
"Kindergarten used to be getting kids ready for first grade," said Bree
Schuhrke Madison Camelview Elementary School kindergarten teacher. "Now,
it's a grade unto itself."
High-stakes testing, school labels, and federal progress reports have
raised the expectations for the state's youngest pupils, said Nadine Basha,
president of the Arizona State Board Education and chairwoman of the State
School Readiness Board.
"When children come to school now at age 5, the demands are even greater
because of the standards movement," she said. "Particularly for kids at
risk, they start out with the gap - the readiness gap widens."
Children in half-day and full-day kindergarten classes have the same
learning goals, said Karen Woodhouse, Arizona deputy associate
superintendent of early education. The difference is the time spent on the
goals, she said.
"Teachers tell us they have more time to work with children in full-day
programs," Woodhouse said. "They can individualize instruction. They have
time to provide the support for kids, so they are able to take away more."
By the end of kindergarten, children must be beginning readers. For
parents, that means their 5-year-olds will use known words, look at
pictures to create a story and write a minimum of 25 words, like "mom,"
"the" and "dog."
Parents visiting kindergarten classes will see that everything their child
does, from coloring to playing with puzzles, is connected to reading,
writing and math, Woodhouse said.
Even as a group of 5-year-olds pushed their hands into the colorful
playdough at one of the workstations in Schuhrke's kindergarten classroom,
they were working on an assignment. Their task was to take the 3-inch
cookie-cutter letters and press them into the mushy dough.
"What letter is that?" she asked them.
"An 'R,' " said one girl.
"What sound does 'R' make?"
At the end of kindergarten, Schuhrke must show that her students made one
year of academic growth.
"I need to prove what they are learning," Schuhrke said. "I test them when
they get in here, test them midyear and I will test them at the end of the
year."
In a recent survey by the National Center for Education Statistics,
kindergarten teachers across the country said they spend 68 percent of the
day on reading. Half-day programs spend nearly 100 percent of the time on
language arts and reading readiness. In a full-day program there is time
for math, science and art, according to the Early Childhood Longitudinal
Study.
At Smith school, kindergarten teacher Diana Quintana has little pictures
around the room that identify objects: a door, the bathroom, the sink. The
words and pictures are clues for the English learners. Her job is a double
order, Alvarez said as he observed.
"Point to the longest word in the sentence," Quintana said to one pupil.
The eager child couldn't even point to the sentence. She repeated the
lesson until the child could identify the sentence and the longest word.
"She has more time now to really give it a good effort," Alvarez said.
"Time is definitely a resource."
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