The unfortunate tendency of children to want to play
and enjoy themselves must stop,
How can we maintain our economic and military
superiority if preschool and kindergarten children waste time "learning
about being a member of a community" and "how to get along with
others"? Contrary to June Sholnit Sale's assertion (letters, March
25), the problem is that we are not dedicating more of preschool and
kindergarten to academics.
And we need to start academics even
earlier: We need preschool readiness testing to ensure that parents teach their
toddlers to count and develop pre-phonics skills to prepare them for
preschool. I have recommended even earlier intervention: See my
paper, "Phonemic awareness training for prelinguistic children: Do
we need prenatal PA?" (Reading Improvement 35: 1998.)
The unfortunate tendency of children to
want to play and enjoy themselves must stop, despite claims of mushy-minded
"experts" who claim that play improves "social and emotional
development," whatever that is.
Children should not be allowed to behave
like children.
Stephen Krashen
President, Kindergarten Kalculus Association
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