[This entry was contributed by guest blogger Marissa Castro Mikoy, the director of the Universal Pre-Kindergarten Incentive Program at CentroNía, an educational community-based organization in Washington, D.C.]
As a pre-k program administrator, it can be easy to think, "I have a great curriculum, classrooms full of top-notch materials - we are all set." Experience has taught me that providing a high-quality program takes much more, from the cultivation of parent involvement to professional development that meets the needs of each teacher. Many components must converge and be fostered to achieve "high quality." Here are my thoughts on a couple of these key pieces.
Teachers: Just having "great" teachers does not necessarily translate to a high-quality program. It is imperative that programs invest in teachers and nurture their professional development. Through the program I lead at CentroNía, funds are available for all teachers to continue their education. In fact, we have a number of teachers who have gone back to school to obtain an associate's or bachelor's degree in early childhood education. Our program benefits not only from having better-prepared teachers but also from having teachers who reciprocate and invest even more of themselves in our center.
Families: The development of a strong family involvement plan is just as important. At CentroNía, we host monthly Family Nights, a time when parents share food and conversation while teachers and staff help them learn about the program curriculum, child development, parenting strategies, and more. Through these events, our families begin to view each other, not just our staff, as resources and supports. I have seen parents of different cultural and economic backgrounds develop relationships at these meetings, and one parent I know of organized a weekend play group based on relationships forged at Family Night.
At an even deeper level, Family Night helps us identify parents interested in serving on the city-wide Parent Advisory Council. Parents from each of D.C.'s 17 Pre-K Incentive Program organizations sit on the council, and among other things have helped organize written testimony and support for the city's publicly-funded program, igniting greater family involvement and advocacy at many pre-k centers.
When families, teachers, and program staff have opportunities like these to interact, form bonds, and grow, I believe the result is a strong, collaborative team that works energetically to sustain the high quality standards all parties desire.
My thanks to all of you readers and Sophia for letting me share a little about CentroNía and the D.C. Pre-K Incentive Program with you over the past week. I look forward to reading your entries and comments and responding with more of my own stories.
[This entry was contributed by guest blogger Marissa Castro Mikoy, the director of the Universal Pre-Kindergarten Incentive Program at CentroNía, an educational community-based organization in Washington, D.C.]
Transitioning to kindergarten in Washington, D.C., is not the easiest process in the world. Public charter schools, neighborhood public schools, private schools, "out of boundary" schools... For parents, learning the differences between schools and what those differences might mean for their child is key to answering the million-dollar question, Where should my child go to school?
At CentroNía, we make a concerted effort to help families find the answer. Working with and supporting all our pre-k families, especially immigrant families, has proven to be helpful and rewarding. After the transition process, I've noticed that parents are typically more confident and, in turn, more likely to participate in school meetings or to simply schedule a meeting with their child’s kindergarten teacher.
So, what does our transition process entail? Well, we start by preparing individualized transitions packets for parents. Each packet contains a neighborhood map with plotted color-coded points representing the child's eligible public school, the closest public charter schools, and private schools in the neighborhood. We also provide contact information and school statistics for each school on the map.
Next, we host two breakfast meetings for parents to drop in, pick up their transitions packets, and grab a meal. Our resident CentroNía "transitions experts" are available at these meetings to talk one-on-one with parents, helping them to review the information in their packets, understand the differences between each school in depth, and even complete charter school applications.
More individual attention follows our breakfast events, for I've found that even afterwards there are parents who have more questions but feel intimidated by the thought of calling a school's principal or counselor. I often meet with parents to coach them on starting a dialogue with a school and, in some cases, to serve as a translator.
With individualized guidance and support, a child and his or her family can transition smoothly from pre-k to kindergarten and beyond. Research continues to show that family involvement demonstrates to children the value of their education and their families' role in it. This process should be a partnership with families, and I think we, at CentroNía and across the early childhood community, are proving how that can be done. Pre-k's ability to give children and parents critical skills and confidence is a huge reason why these programs are an important first step in improving K-12 education.
I would love to hear what other communities are doing by way of transitions work. Please post a comment with your ideas or thoughts.
After reading the reports about the link between childcare and negative behavior problems later on, I thought it might be helpful to hear a parent’s take on the effect of pre-k on her son’s development. I decided to interview Ravon’s mother (“RM” for the remainder of the interview).
Ms. Pappas: Why did you decide to enroll Ravon in pre-k?
RM: I didn’t want a lot of play for Ravon. My younger brother was in your class the previous year, and I always liked the way you involved the parents in the homework assignments. I like the interaction with me and Ravon because I know what he is learning and we can work on further developing his listening and language skills together. Also, you still let them play in your classroom, but they learn through the play. Daycare was just play, play, color, color, all day long, but not enough learning.
Ms. Pappas: What do you think about recent studies that link childcare programs with negative behavior later on?
RM: Well, I used to work in daycare, so I agree. They tend to baby the kids instead of giving them ways to solve problems when they misbehave. They don’t explain things as much. The regular elementary school pre-k is different. You explain to the child why they are wrong and how they can correct themselves.
Ms. Pappas: How much education do you think a pre-k teacher needs in order to benefit children?
RM: I think experience goes a long way, often more than education. Some people with experience over education can deal with children better. My grandmother had no education and kept eight children in line.
Ms. Pappas: What are the benefits of pre-k?
RM: I have seen so much growth with Ravon. He’s expressing himself better. He’s more disciplined, and he wants to come to school. He doesn’t want to miss a day. My husband and I are so happy.
Ms. Pappas: What are your hopes for Ravon?
RM: Ravon can write, express himself more, interpret things better, read at least on his level.
Ms. Pappas: What about in the long run?
RM: I want my son to go to college. I want him to have a very decent job. I want him to enjoy what he does. It's not as much about the money. I really want him to be happy.
“Your students’ growth will be your growth”: wise words from one of my three greatest role models as a teacher, an older Teach For America teacher who taught in my district.
Each year, as we begin to discuss signs of spring in the sprouting flowers and leaves outside, I can also notice my students’ academic growth, particularly in basic literacy skills. As I observe them throughout the day, I see how the individual action plans I created and implemented facilitated their achievement. The anecdotal notes and work samples in their portfolios provided insights into my students’ strengths and weaknesses. I then used that data to develop teaching plans for both me and the students’ families to follow. While I started using these plans last year, more practice with anecdotal note taking and familiarity with analyzing skill deficits using our performance based assessments strengthened my ability to target and address student needs this year. The success of this valuable teaching tool makes me feel like I have really improved as an instructional leader.
Here are just a few examples of their growth:
• David’s anecdotes and work samples from the fall revealed the need to work on listening skills (e.g., incorporating ideas from discussions into play). Consequently, I linked my questions before and during choice time to ideas we had discussed during circle time. I also brought in more topics that seemed to appeal to him, such as transportation and animals. David recently approached me with a toy airplane and his name card and said, “Look Ms. Pappas, the airplane ‘bout to take off on the runway. It can’t just go straight up, it has to go like this,” as he rolled to airplane on the flat surface and then had it take off. • Tyrone’s target areas in the fall included relating stories to his own life. So, I worked on this skill with Tyrone in whole-group and small-group instruction, modeling how to connect stories to our own experiences. For example, during a read aloud of Cat in the Hat, I might relate to the experience of the children sitting at home on a rainy day by saying, “I remember when it was pouring rain and I couldn’t go outside to play tag with my friends. I felt sad.” I also designed activities around comparing and contrasting characters’ lives with our own. Tyrone’s recent literary insights include: “I took a long train like the one in the book to New York.” and “I went to the zoo too. We saw an elephant.” • In the fall, Fuquan was strong in letter identification and was starting to identify beginning sounds in words. From that foundation, he needed to work on making letter-sound connections and using that skill to write words. My plan for him included playing letter-sound sorting games in small group, discussing sounds in words one on one during activities like journal time, and singing songs about letter sounds during transition times. Fuquan is now labeling his drawings with the letters that match the pictures and can write short sentences with some guidance from me.
I look forward to using my improved planning skills to make the most of the precious few months left with my students this school year.
Last week, the National Task Force on Early Childhood Education for Hispanics released an important report called “Para nuestros niños: Expanding and Improving Early Education for Hispanics." The report highlights the fact that much of the achievement gap between Hispanic children and their peers exists before they enter kindergarten. Citing research on how high-quality pre-k and other early childhood programs improve Hispanic children’s school readiness, the task force issued recommendations aimed at:
Increasing Hispanic children’s access to high-quality early education;
Increasing the number of Spanish-speaking educators; and
Designing and evaluating strategies to strengthen Hispanic children’s language and literacy skills.
What do you think about these objectives and how we can achieve them? How does your pre-k program help Hispanic children and families overcome barriers like access and language?
She did it! After three weeks on her individualized behavior contract, Aniyah finally earned enough points to present a special cheering show in front of the whole class.
As she stepped into the spotlight, Aniyah was surprisingly shy, unlike her attitude when giving frequent, disruptive cheers at inappropriate times. This “command performance” cheer was a bit more subdued. Yet as her friends cheered her on, her face brightened, and you could hear a sense of pride reverberating through her voice.
She cheered while clapping out each letter, “A-N-I-Y-A-H, A-N-I-Y-A-H, Aniyah, Aniyah, I am Aniyah! Aniyah, Aniyah, Aniyah!”
When I shared news of Aniyah’s show with her brother and mother the following day, the pride became contagious. Her family members smiled widely and seemed relieved that Aniyah was showing progress.
Aniyah’s road to victory was not quick and easy. She initially responded to the point system just as she had to our whole class color card behavior system, asking me angrily why I gave her a one or a two or a yellow or blue card instead of connecting her behavior to the negative consequence.
As we had one-on-one conversations each day, focused on her specific behaviors and the number of points that corresponded with them, she began to grasp the relationship between her choices and the consequences. Towards the second week, I would ask her how many points she thought she earned for the day, and she could usually guess correctly based on her own assessment of her behavior.
What does Aniyah’s behavior look like on the rug now? She usually listens to her friends and me attentively and rarely creates a disturbance by calling out. We, of course, still have our cheering moments, but these have become exceptions.
Perhaps best of all, Aniyah’s behavioral improvements have facilitated intellectual growth. She engages more actively in discussion during stories, making predictions and thinking critically about how to solve the characters’ problems. Just last week, she posed the “water car” solution to the problem in Leo Lionni’s classic, Swimmy. After losing his school of fish to one deep sea predator, Swimmy found another school of small fish so petrified of big tuna fish that they would not swim around the ocean. Aniyah’s solution required the small fish to drive a water car out of the ocean away from the big tuna fish. Aniyah was so focused that she not only suggested the idea but also wrote “wtr car” on our solutions list without guidance from me.
Her behavioral and academic progress have gone hand in hand, and I look forward to more improvements in the months ahead. This is one contract that both sides of the table are happy with.
Last week, I had another round of bilateral talks - a.k.a. parent-teacher conferences - which again revealed the importance for pre-k teachers to possess good “diplomatic skills.”
Going into the conferences, I was enthused about discussing my children’s progress. Tanasia, who had struggled to come out of her shell, is now participating throughout the day and moving forward in basic math and literacy skills. A look at David’s writing folder demonstrates clear and constant growth, progressing from self-portraits he labeled with the letter “D” to short sentences written with little guidance using invented spelling.
I grew concerned, though, as I considered a few remaining difficulties with two family members in particular: Kevin’s grandmother, who emphatically disapproves of our literacy program; and Tyrique’s mother, who after more than five attempts to reschedule during the last cycle of conferences still never came.
Despite my efforts to engage her, Kevin’s grandmother had barely spoken to me since our confrontation in January. She had, however, continued to complain to Ms. Morrison during the after-school program proclaiming, “I can’t wait until this year is over.” While this round of conferences focused more heavily on social development and an explanation of a new assessment, I decided to start off our conversation with positive comments relating to her primary concern: literacy. I began by discussing Kevin’s ability to read short sentences with little guidance from me (for example, he can read, “I like to see the fat cat run on the mat.”). I showed her a short, teacher-made assessment I gave to Kevin the day before and modeled how he used his knowledge of letters, letter sounds, and sight words to read. She was so overjoyed with this positive communication that I was able to shift gears and discuss Kevin’s need for further development in other skill areas, such as taking on roles in Dramatic Play, taking turns, and using words to solve conflicts.
Given her absence from the previous conference, I did not expect Tyrique’s mother to respond to the school’s formal efforts to set up conferences for this round. I therefore made plans to reach out to her informally about two weeks before. In addition to mentioning something positive about Tyrique’s performance each time she came in, I would say that I couldn’t wait to talk more about it and show her his great work at the conferences. The day of the conferences she said she couldn’t stay, but we rescheduled for the next morning. I made a comment about celebrating Tyrique over muffins in the morning. She laughed and at 7:45 the next morning was at my door. We had a productive conference and even discussed some behavioral issues which she too has noticed at home.
In both of these cases, I believe it was my ability to talk with parents about their children in a positive light that helped us get past indifference and hostility. It goes to show that, even when parents and teachers don’t see eye to eye or see each other frequently, communication between a child’s home and school is achievable and beneficial to all.
Certain birthdays represent meaningful thresholds in our society; times at which someone decided we are ready to take on new responsibilities. After seeing Aniyah today on her birthday, I’m beginning to think we should add the big ZERO-FIVE to that list.
Aniyah often has difficulty concentrating on group work and respecting others when they are speaking, but today I saw improvement. During clean-up time I noticed Aniyah reminding her friends to put their name cards back. We all know that if we forget, we will have to wait a couple of minutes before going to choice time the next day. As Aniyah told classmates to “put your cards back, and be responsible” with a sing-song tone, I rushed over and thanked her for being such a great cheerleader.
We decided, spur of the moment, on a new title that connects her affinity for cheering to the classroom activities: Responsibility Cheerleader. Her face lit up, and she smiled as she repeated the cheer while heading into the bathroom to wash her hands before lunch time. I plan on applying this role to other parts of the day and think that, if she takes ownership of the cheer and receives encouragement and appreciation from me, the new role could, in fact, make her more responsible and respectful of her friends.
Aniyah also did a great job focusing during whole-group time on the rug, usually a challenging activity for her. When she did call out disruptively, I did not call on her. She ended up crying, because she did not get a chance to convey her thoughts. I consider that a breakthrough as it indicates she is caring more about participating in discussions than doing her own thing.
Now, I’m not really sure if it was a heightened sense of maturity on her birthday that led to Aniyah’s super day or her mother’s promise of a Princess Barbie birthday party in return for better behavior. So, I’m covering my bases and have spoken with her mother about an individualized behavior contract, which I plan on creating with Aniyah tomorrow morning. As I have learned from experience, if we can isolate those behaviors we want to change and design rewards around a child’s interests, the child, the family, and I can more effectively focus on specific problems and lasting solutions.
From high attendance at special events to an open and inviting dialogue at one-on-one conferences, my relationships with students’ families this year have been both positive and strong. That is until last Thursday.
As I welcomed one of my students and his grandmother with my usual energetic greeting, bright and early during the before school program, the grandmother abruptly cut me off with sharp and heated criticism of the homework assignments I have sent home. She wanted to know when I would be sending home “letter work,” like she has seen in “all the daycare centers.” She has become weary of the open-ended assignments, which often include searching for letters around the house on food containers and in magazines or having the child tell a story with pictures and then dictate the story to an adult.
Her bottom line was this: She wants dittos. There, I said it, the “d” word, dreaded among early childhood experts. Like them, I advocate a different “d” approach, one that is perhaps the anti-thesis of the malignant ditto: “Developmentally Appropriate Practices.” She then went on to critique my teaching of her grandson during the day, arguing that I wasn’t “teaching him his letters” and that she would instead have “to buy some workbooks for him to use at home.”
As a pre-k teacher striving to meet my class's developmental needs, I provide my students with plenty of opportunities to learn through hands on experiences that are meaningful to them. If the sand table particularly interests her grandson, he will find plenty of letter tools to explore the alphabet in the sand. If he chooses to pretend he is a doctor in the Dramatic Play Area, we will surely learn about letters and, perhaps equally as important, why we use them, as he writes down his patient’s diagnosis and prescription. I also supplement this experiential learning with various letter songs and games.
I, therefore, started to wonder how pages of letter matching and tracing activities would help lay a strong foundation in early literacy for her grandson. To top it off, her grandson actually knows all of his letters and the letter sounds. We are currently working on sounding out and writing words. When I tried to explain my strategies and her grandson’s progress, she just replied, “I don’t want to hear it. I know all about it, learning through play. I don’t want to hear it.” She then proceeded to storm out, leaving me feeling puzzled, powerless, and, quite frankly, nauseous.
It is now January. I have had one formal one-on-one conference with her and several informal conversations at our special events. She has never once mentioned any concern about our work. I am not sure what exactly prompted the negative exchange, but I do know that our relationship has been damaged. I suppose I could treat her comments as an irrational rant, and just keep doing what I am doing. But as a teacher, I serve my students and their families. If there is a conflict, it is my responsibility as the classroom leader to think objectively about how best to handle the situation.
I have decided to provide her and the rest of my students’ family members with a list
of ways we teach letters and letter sounds in the classroom. I look forward to hearing her response.
“Hello, my name is Tanasia Britch from Pre-k 114. We will now sing Dr. King,”
Tanasia exclaimed loud and clear for everyone, grades pre-k through two, to hear.
She did it! After a tough transition in the beginning of the year, Tanasia slowly began to participate in classroom activities without much encouragement from me or her peers. Moreover, rather than repeatedly crying and inquiring about the time of her mother’s return, she now focuses on a wide range of subjects including bears and cars. The more she shares with us in terms of her thoughts and interests, the better able I am to chart her academic growth. Her gradual progress culminated in her widely acclaimed introduction of our class performance during the school assembly commemorating the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Her other accomplishments during the past two weeks include:
Counting each of her friends for snack time in a clear and loud voice without skipping anyone;
Identifying and chanting out the letters in the word "like" in our modeled morning message for the first time; and
Choosing to read books to and with her friends rather than reading alone. Tanasia even encouraged her friend to read with her when she saw her friend crying.
As I reflect on her growth, I consider two major reasons for Ms. Morrison’s and my success with Tanasia:
Student-Driven Instruction: We took the time to understand Tanasia's interests and provided opportunities for her to talk about and make things for her family. Our discussions at the rug, during lunch, and at choice time included plenty of open-ended questions which allowed Tanasia to speak openly about what was on her mind: her sisters, mother, father, and auntie. If the mouse ate cookies and asked for some milk, we learned about how happy Tanasia feels when she eats cookies and drinks milk with her sister at home. In addition, while Tanasia first hesitated to join her friends during choice time, she began to gravitate towards the Art and Writing areas once she learned that she could take home her finished products. Tanasia may have been physically separated from her family, but since she had the chance to talk about and make things for her siblings and parents, she still felt connected to them while in school; and
Classroom Culture of High Expectations: We consistently responded to Tanasia’s crying with the expectation that she would eventually become more of an active and enthusiastic member of our classroom community. Rather than excuse her from class activities or call her family to pick her up, we taught her all of the routines and rules like the rest of the children. If she needed to cry when she first came in, she could, but she still needed to unpack, put her Math Homelink journal in the bin, wash her hands, and get her own breakfast.
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