What I appreciate about Chester Finn is that he always has some good points to make. But Finn makes one good point and several questionable and fallacious ones in his Washington Post Op-Ed, “Slow the Preschool Bandwagon” (May 15, 2009). The good point is that it would help at-risk children and their families to have intensive support from birth to age five. When this was done in North Carolina’s Abecedarian Project, I.Q. scores rose, special education placement rates fell from 48 percent to 25 percent, and grade retention declined from 55 percent to 31 percent.

Even two years of appropriate early intervention can make a huge difference for children from low-income homes. The Chicago Child-Parent Centers and High/Scope’s Perry Preschool both provided two years of preschool for at-risk children and produced significant long-term gains: higher graduation rates, fewer teens becoming mothers, reduced criminal activity, fewer special education placements, less grade retention. The results are compelling by human measures as well as economic ones. Every dollar invested brought significant returns.

Where Mr. Finn errs is in thinking that preschools must emphasize the “cognitive side of kindergarten preparation (e.g., pre-literacy skills such as letters, sounds and shapes) and judging the effectiveness of such programs by the readiness of their graduates.” The last administration spent billions of dollars on just such didactic instruction in the Reading First program, but reading comprehension levels did not increase.

We already know why. The High/Scope Comparative Preschool Curriculum Study showed that at-risk children in a preschool emphasizing didactic instruction lagged far behind matched groups of at-risk children who attended preschools rich in play and experiential learning. Decades of research studies support the conclusion that young children learn best through play and other activities they freely choose themselves.

Children in need of extra support need good teachers who provide an enriched environment that strengthens children’s skills. They need help to build the bridge from oral language to print literacy. They need time to explore language, math, and life itself in playful, experiential ways so that every step becomes an important lasting gain.

The didactic approach to preschool that Finn espouses is based on ideology, not science. It is leading to serious setbacks for many children. A Yale study recently found that the highest rate of school expulsion was in preschool—three times higher than the national rate for K-12 students. And 4.5 times more boys are expelled than girls.

Cognitive is not the same as “test-measurable”.  Cognitive means using one’s mind.  There’s a long history of evidence that young children learn more efficiently in self-initiated cognitive activity—often called “play.”  We’re in the middle of a huge experiment in eliminating play earlier and earlier—and it bodes ill for the nation.

Teachers and school psychologists report an alarming increase in extreme behavior problems in young children. Children are under pressure from many sides, including preschools and kindergartens that expect them to function like first-graders. Eventually they explode. The resulting problems can be deep and long-lasting.

What is happening in today’s preschools is already problematic for many children. Chester Finn is correct that it is time to reassess current trends, but if we follow his lead the situation is likely to become worse for the very children most in need of our help.

That’s why, Chester, it’s complex.  I’m not happy either with what Kindergarten looks like today, and pre-kindergarten is likely to follow suit.  So it’s a real dilemma, but what we’re doing now for too many 3- and 4-year-olds cannot be continued.  

To help ensure that we do a better job in the future, The Forum is partnering with the Alliance for Childhood on Thursday, May 28, in Washington, DC for a discussion defining developmentally appropriate early learning. Joan Almon and I will facilitate the conversation.

Panelists will use the Alliance’s recent report, Crisis in the Kindergarten, as a springboard for discussion around instruction, assessment and elementary school readiness - especially for disadvantaged children.

You can also learn more about the report from a recent column from the New York Times.

(NOTE: This post was written with Joan Almon, Director of the Alliance for Childhood)