Education begins at birth
October 30, 2009
By Terry Falk, 8th District School Board Director
Child care in this community is a mess. Some daycare providers have been falsifying records. Child welfare agencies aren’t protecting children. We all can say that parents should do a better job. Some won’t; others can’t.
Many of those children will make their way into Milwaukee Public Schools emotionally damaged and years behind developmentally.
Critics might complain that MPS already has too much to do and why should we pay for childcare anyway. Frankly, we don’t have much choice. We either pay now or pay later.
Ann Terrell directs early childhood programs for MPS and sees what challenges these children face upon entering school. Some children don’t know their full names. They can’t get along with other children, sit still, or wait their turn. The first time a child has ever had a book read to them was when they entered school. Television was their only source of information. Some children will never catch up; they will fall only farther behind.
MPS is no longer waiting for children to enter kindergarten at age 4 or 5. This system has dramatically increased its 3-year-old kindergarten and daycare for children as young as 2.
But MPS knows even that is not enough, so this year it is expanding daycare at two schools for children as young as 6 weeks. More infant daycare is likely to follow.
Whatever you may think about the ability of MPS to provide education for children in this community, many state and local officials consider MPS as the gold standard when it comes to early child care and education.
The programs are being paid for by a combination of fees paid by parents and state subsidies that would normally go to commercial daycare providers.
Lost in all this is the excellent work done by a great many independent daycare providers and dedicated social workers, but still too many children are falling between the cracks.
Critics might complain that MPS already has too much to do and why should we pay for childcare anyway. Frankly, we don’t have much choice. We either pay now or pay later. By making sure that children are protected and receive proper guidance and instruction at an early age, we can dramatically cut costs for special education and remediation. This is money well spent.
Terry Falk is the Milwaukee Public Schools Director for the Eighth District, which includes Bay View. He can be reached at (414) 510-9173 or falktf@milwaukee.k12.wi.us.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Beverley Smith on Fri, 30th Oct 2009 6:40 am
I beg to agree that education begins at birth and then to disagree with the way the writer takes that theory. It is true kids are always learning and therefore kids don’t just learn at daycare. They learn with grandma, dad, mom, the sitter, the nanny, and they learn best if their individual questions are answered, their interests are noticed and catered to and they are not mass -warehoused. I see nothing more offensive in life that a row of assembly -line playpens, highchairs or cots for toddlers. This is not early learning. This is big brother socializing kids into robots. I am a kindergarten teacher and I also think the facts are far from what the writer above reports. In fact, those kids who went to daycare from birth are usually very hyperactive, needy of attention, unlikely to have basic skills of reading for sure because no daycare takes the time to teach kids other than chanting the alphabet and tracing letters. The ones raised at home till age 6 are the ones who actually are well balanced, polite, patient, can amuse themselves, and likely are farther along the learning paradigm, able to read. The thing is with a very educated parental population nowadays, the ones who are home with the kids are devoting incredible time to teaching their kids there -that’s why they’re home. It works. The myth that bad parents are home with the kids is just inaccurate. The drug addicted, alcoholic parent is the one most likely to want to get rid of the kid and foist them off on someone else. Some daycare kids thrive, meaning they manage. They are nearly never exceptional for brilliance. Some at home raised kids are shy, but they quickly learn to socialized with the 25 others since they also had the pleasure of strong friendships with siblings, parents, playmates.
If kids are born learning, we must respect wherever they are as a learning location and whoever is teaching them as an early childhood educator. That includes great parents.