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Come on in.
Hey Santee.
Come on in.
I'd like to pick your brain about something.
Sure, come on in.
Well I been stressing about school readiness. I keep hearing about play-based curriculum,
the value of play, and how kids should be able to explore. But I have all these standards
to meet and skills I'm supposed to teach my kids before they go to kindergarten. The two
things just don't seem to match.
I know what you mean. There seems to be pressure from all sides to prepare kids for school.
There is a lot of confusion about the best way to do it, and not much help to figure
it out.
Exactly. Sometimes I'm just not sure what to do, but I worry that some of my kids won't
be ready for kindergarten.
Well I read an article recently by Barbara Bauman that helped me think about this big
curriculum question. She said teachers need to know about general child development but
also know what experiences kids bring with them to the classroom, and then organize new
experiences to build on what they already know.
That makes sense to me but I have kids from different socioeconomic groups and cultural
backgrounds in my class. I know they don't all need the same things, but I also know
that the schools have the same expectations for all of them.
Think about how you could align children's backgrounds and interests with the expectations
the standards address.
Here's the thought from the Bauman article that I keep in mind to help me remember that.
"There is no such thing as developmental competence outside of a cultural context."
That's a lot to think about. But at least I feel like I have a start and a strategy
to move forward.
Okay, give it some more thought and then let's talk again.