When my daughter started kindergarten there were 3 ELL children 1 had been in Canada 2 weeks and spoke no English. Within a month that girl was speaking broken English and communicating with most of the kids in the class. The more she was exposed to other English speaking kids the better she spoke. She speaks beautifully now, with no accent, she also helped her mom speak English by practicing with her.

That said, I still am not a huge supporter of all day kindergarten, and I've already mentioned that in previous blogs, but if it will get me a full time position, I'll work with it (for now).

Now for year round school....Aghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!, Please... can't our children have time to explore the world? Can't they have unprogrammed time to figure out who they are? And can't they have free time to learn how to entertain themselves (self regulation, time for development of imagination and all that stuff).

As for rankings and GCI, It takes about 14 years of education to finish high school, and about 20 years to finish an undergrad. If we are to connect GCI to education pillars and ranking shouldn't we connect the GCI to the country's education level ranking from At Least 20 years prior? Just a thought. And yes, I do agree that GCI is affected by many more criteria than education, (international trade for one) but a country's quality of education does help.

As for our amazing school system (yes Canada does have very good standings educationally), why is it that after 13 years of school, college, university courses, I only first heard of the residential schools four years ago? (I knew about internment camps but not residential schools) At least now, we are finally starting to admit to our appauling behavior. Hopefully we have learned from our behavior and do not repeat these sins.

One more unrelated note. Thank you for your support, understanding and putting up with all of my classroom comments (I couldn't help myself because I thoroughly enjoyed your course).

I never really connected all day kingergarten to any head start program. I was always under the assumption that headstart programs were meant to prepare at risk children for their future school years by exposing the children to educational resources (books, songs, games and interaction) that they may not be receiving at home and parental support. I suppose that a full day program could give at risk children more opportunities to be exposed to language and language development tools but I can't help but feel its a situation of too little too late. Ideally, we want children to have plenty of exposure to books and parental interaction long before kindergarten. I believe true headstart programs have enormous benefits to at risk children and families regardless of skewed studies and politicians with different agendas.

Unfortunately, I'm not convinced that all day kindergarten will have the same benefits and don't think they should really be compared to each other. Personally I'm glad my children were not in all day kindergarten, because the half day system allowed me to spend time with my kids. I do believe that they benefited from the experience. But, I was lucky, not many parents have that same luxury and desperately need daycare for their children. Full time kindergarten eases the financial load a great deal and provides a structured environment that benefits some children. I hope that all day kindergarten will be beneficial to the children enrolled in it and it may even raise EQAO scores down the road.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if all learning environments consisted almost entirely of active learning! Sarena mentioned in her lecture that university students can focus for about 15 minutes in a lecture. That focus time decreases dramatically and incrementally for senior, intermediate, junior and primary students. Lectures like Serena's are particularily poignant for me as I contemplate my teaching style and its effects on my future students.

As a parent I've always subscribed to the belief that providing my children an opportunity to make their own discoveries is extremely important in their intellectual development. As a teacher, I've also seen first hand, the difference in the motivation level of students when they are actively engaged in their learning compared to being passively engaged. They retain much more of what they learn too. Why then do elementary teachers fall back on giving photocopies of seat work to their students? Some elements of the school curriculum lend themselves to active learning more than others. Some aspects are learned best through repetition. Active learning lessons take a great deal of time. The process of making your own discoveries takes much more time than being given the answers and frankly, there isn't enough time in the school day to cover the entire curriculum effectively as it stands. So... teachers need to blend active and passive learning opportunities. I also believe that passive learning opportunities are necessary to help child develop the skills needed for sustained attention. Let's face it, sometimes people need to just shut up and listen.

So yes, I will plan as many lessons as I can to actively engage my students, but I will also need to blend some passive learning opportunities into my lesson plans as well. Hopefully, I will find the balance that provides enough active learning opportunities to engage, excite and motivate my students, and enough passive learning opportunities to develop skills and help develop their sustained attention.

Three interesting presentations this week.
When Natanel started his, I got a little concerned because the topic of his was the Importance of Parental Interaction and my presentation involves parental input/interaction and the social aspects of language. But fortunately, most of what he spoke about was different from what I will present. Watching the video of the still face experiment was extremely difficult for me to watch. I don't know how that mother was able to continue with her still face for as long as she did. I wonder if the experience stayed with the infant for any length of time. Children need to feel as if their primary caregiver will always be there for them. The still faced mother almost appeared as if she had been turned off and was no longer present mentally. Will the child fear the mother returning to that state? I can understand why it would be so difficult to get ethical approval to run an experiment with still face in it. As an adult, I think I would be bothered by someone using the still face with me, although, I would probably be much more concerned for the person with the still face. Quite interesting idea though.

The one point that sort of stuck with me with Emanuella's presentation was the assumption shown in the video that women know how to parent instinctively, and that men don't know how (or are struggling to figure it out). I believe that is, sort of a load of rubbish. The truth is people assume women will instinctively know how to parent, but that is where the problem lies. When a new mother is feeling unsure, she often is pressured by the perception that she should know what to do. Often mother's are embarrassed to admit they aren't sure what to do, after all, aren't we all supposed to be born knowing how to parent? I have yet to meet a new mother who isn't feeling a little insecure about her ability to be a good mother - and most won't talk about it until they've become more comfortable with their new role. After 15 years of mothering I'm still not exactly sure what the right thing to do is in every situation. My mother tells me, that after 55 years of mothering, she's still not sure (and I think she's an amazing mom). So I guess, women don't instinctively know how to mother.

I'm always intrigued by infants ability to recognize all phones and phonemes and their eventual loss of that ability. I'm looking forward to watching the online video of the demonstration from Wendy's presentation.

Just checked out the KidSpark webpage and kinda kicking myself for not discovering it sooner. Inquiry based learning is such a huge part of the education philosophy right now, and after 3 years in York's Concurrent Ed program I definitely know the benefits of having children find and answer their own questions. When students are involved in their own learning, they make a much deeper connection to the material - it sticks with them for a long time. Talk about intrinisically motivating students! I just checked out the program for March at KidSpark and I'm pretty sure my kids would've loved them when they were younger, especially Gross Olympics (on second thought, they probably would still love playing around there). Never thought, to find interesting and engaging lesson plans by googling - inquiry based lessons. I will definitely be adding that to my lesson plan research repetoire (Thanks Kelly).

The overschedulization of children has been a concern of mine for quite a long time. I have always believed that giving children free time, allows them to develop their imagination, creativity, intelligence and quest for knowledge. Not to mention gives them time to discover who they are and what they can do. Having time to investigate a blade of grass while playing outside can instill curiosity about the world in a child.

It's interesting that ADHD rates rise as time for imaginative play decrease. (I do not consider time spent in front of a tv, gaming system of computer terminal free time. It consumes your attention without allowing you time to imagine.) It was mentioned in the presentation that pretend play helps develop impulse control. If that is true, than maybe the risk of developing ADHD increases when children have not had plenty of opportunity to entertain themselves.

Even though all-day kindergarten may allow me find a teaching position (yes, most of the teacher candidates are excited about this), I can't help but feel the implementation of all day kindergarten may have some drawbacks. After logging many hours in JK and SK classes, I have seen how tired the children become after a half day of classes. I've also seen how difficult it can be for 1 teacher (and a parent volunteer) to manage 18 tired four year olds. I'm concerned that parent volunteers will drop off dramatically after ECEs are brought into the classroom, so the thought of upping the class size to 26 will be very tough on everyone.

From what I've seen, getting testing for potential ADHD, LD, mentally retarded and many other disorders is held often for years. It has little to do with teachers identifying at risk kids. Waiting lists for psyc evaluations often take years (8 years in the case of the son of a friend of mine), so the claim that all day kindergarten will assist educators in identifying at risk kids is meritless.

I'm also concerned that the students will be pushed a little too hard for their age group. The report commented that kindergarten should be a place to learn through play. That claim is idealistic. No matter how much teachers are not supposed to teach to EQAO, administrators are quite concerned with low scores and push teachers to prepare the kids years in advance. Will administrators start pushing the literacy skills even harder in kindergarten? How will December babies and slower learners keep up with the increased work load?