Would you want a teacher trying to make your 3 yr. old read?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What school are you at OP? Or can you at least give us the city?

I heard about this policy at the French Maternal School in NW DC.

The English language can be very frustrating to a 3 year old. But if they're teaching them to read in French, than I'm all for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nope. I would want a teacher trying to make my three year old love books.

Good answer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. By "make", I mean it's a top priority for the school. If the children are reading at age three, they feel like they're "successful".

That is successful. Who wants a kid who can't read?

[Anonymous]

Love of books/reading is nurtured in children of this age by reading to them.

[Anonymous]

There is no correlation between early reading and success. Do your research.

[Anonymous]

My child learned his letter names and a lot of his sounds at age 3. I think it was perfectly fine. He did not have the patience to sit down and read though till about 4.5 and even that was just a couple of words at a time. The letter names and sounds were done with games.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child learned his letter names and a lot of his sounds at age 3. I think it was perfectly fine. He did not have the patience to sit down and read though till about 4.5 and even that was just a couple of words at a time. The letter names and sounds were done with games.

How old is he now?

[Anonymous]

If your child has an interest in learning to read at that age and has developed the early literacy skills to support this then go for it.

Personally I would not be comfortable with this type of school. I say this as someone with a degree in early childhood education. At this age they should be in a literacy-rich environment that encourages building the foundational literacy skills, but reading as a top priority at this age is a red-flag for me (for all those except the truly exceptional genius children).

What is the school's philosophy towards supporting the development of other domains? Particularly social-emotional development as that is key at this age. There is a greater correlation between healthy social-emotional development (particularly self-regulation skills) and academic success in elementary school (and beyond) than there is correlation between early readers or intelligence and academic success.

[Anonymous]

neurotic morons

Let's see if you make it to 60 stroke-free.

[Anonymous]

I'm a preschool teacher.

I don't think that starting a child on decoding should be the priority in a 3 year old program. I think that there's a place in preschool for some rhyming games, and quick lessons on letters and sounds, and reading a schedule that's set up to go left to right, but not much more.

On the other hand, I think that a good 3 year old program should be very much focused on the skills that kids will need to be skilled readers in middle school and beyond. For example, I think that a good preschool program includes:

Lots of opportunities for kids to grow their vocabulary in the context of stories, and science "experiments", and field trips and more. Afterall, research tells us that vocabulary is a huge predictor and driver of reading skills.

Lots of opportunities for kids to understand the structure of a narrative, through dramatic play, and acting out the stories in a book, and working with props like flannel boards, and puppets. Because we know that kids who can visualize a story in their head, understand it better, and understanding what is read is the heart of reading.

Lots of opportunities for kids to develop their oral language, by talking talking talking, and listening to each other talk, at the lunch table, and in the block corner, and at show and tell. Because kids develop their sense of syntax and morphology by practicing and practicing, and until they know what sounds right when they say it, they can't begin to use context cues to support their decoding, or the understand complex sentences.

Lots of opportunities for kids to have experiences with print in meaningful contexts, such as hanging up their coat on the hook with their very own name, and dictating the text for a birthday card to Grandma.

All of these things build readers, and all of them belong in a good preschool program. If a program is rich enough in these things, some kids will make the jump to reading in their 3 or 4 year old year, and almost all of the rest will start Kindergarten so ready to read that they take off.

[Anonymous]

And that, ladies and gentleman, is where your child should be going to school - at that PP's school!

[Anonymous]

I'm French and in France children learn pre-reading skills in preschool (ecole maternelle) and reading in 1st grade (cours preparatoire, or CP). Reading in French is harder in my opinion than reading in English.

I do not know the French Maternelle in this area (my children learn French at home), but I am highly skeptical that they would force actual reading on a 3 year old! It simply does not work that way. The few 3 year olds who are ready to learn will learn (my DD is one of those) but the majority will just not get it (my DS would have been in that category).

Most likely the school is emphasizing PRE-reading skills, like sounding out different individual letters and then, at a more advanced level, uniquely French phonemes like "eau", "ei", "oe", etc.

I am fine with that, and indeed sending my DD to a Montessori school which carries the same emphasis, but in English. That is developmentally appropriate. They will also learn to write, count using manipulatives and take care of their environment.

[Anonymous]

18:56 Nine. Why? No reading issues now if that's why you're asking. Honestly I would have preferred he go to a school like 21:56 with the drama built in but I toured 15 of them and didn't find it. Other than the lack of drama, the preschool was pretty similar to 21:56's.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:18:56 Nine. Why? No reading issues now if that's why you're asking. Honestly I would have preferred he go to a school like 21:56 with the drama built in but I toured 15 of them and didn't find it. Other than the lack of drama, the preschool was pretty similar to 21:56's.

No, I wasn't asking because of any possible reading issues. I was courious if early readers stay ahead of later readers. I once had the head of one of those ultra-elite NYC schools, tell me no. By 6th grade, he said you couldn't tell which were which.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:18:56 Nine. Why? No reading issues now if that's why you're asking. Honestly I would have preferred he go to a school like 21:56 with the drama built in but I toured 15 of them and didn't find it. Other than the lack of drama, the preschool was pretty similar to 21:56's.

No, I wasn't asking because of any possible reading issues. I was courious if early readers stay ahead of later readers. I once had the head of one of those ultra-elite NYC schools, tell me no. By 6th grade, he said you couldn't tell which were which.

I'm the preschool teacher PP.

What the research seems to show is this.

If you have 2 kids, and you put them both in a preschool program that pushes decoding. Now, let's say that one kid gets it, and enters kindergarten reading fluently, and the other kid doesn't, and enters kindergarten knowing 1/2 their letters.

In this case, it's likely, although not definite, that the child who entered with stronger skills will continue to have stronger reading skills.

Now, imagine that you take the same 2 kids and put them in a program that emphasizes play, with very little instruction on decoding. One child picks up a lot by osmosis, and enters kindergarten knowing 1/2 their letters, and the other enters kindergarten knowing none.

Again, the child who ends up with the stronger skills, will continue to have stronger reading skills.

However, if you then compare the top kid from each of the two pairs. The one who was pushed, and can now read, and the one who wasn't pushed, and now knows 1/2 the alphabet, you're going to find that they even out very quickly. The effect of pushing wears off, and by 2nd or 3rd grade, the two kids will be indistinguishable in their decoding ability. The same thing is true of the two kids on the bottom. The one who came in with less with catch up. So, the early instruction was pretty useless, as it didn't lead to lasting gains.

On the other hand, the playbased instruction that the first group missed, during the time they were sitting and being drilled on reading, wasn't useless. The kids in the second group will continue to show gains in social problem solving, something that's a huge predictor of long term success, long after any reading gains have worn off.