Speaking to educators in Atlanta, US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan "says the key to solving the education crisis in the United States is offering quality early childhood programs to every child" (AP Report). In the same week, Colorado's Lieutenant Governor Barbara O'Brien cited the famous Hart/Risley study on language development:
By age three, children whose parents are on welfare have vocabularies of about 500 words, children of working class parents have about 700 words, and children of college-educated parents have vocabularies of about 1,200 words (Risely, Hart, 1995). Yet words are the key to how successfully children make their way in the world.The education crisis begins before formal education begins. The education crisis begins at home.
What role does preschool play?
Preschool and kindergarten are playful learning environments which play an important role in education. Yet they cannot play the role of prevention. If viewed as an academic intervention, they must be seen as treatment. For, as O'Brien pointed out, significant learning disparities exist by age 3. That is not to say that treatment in preschool is not better than treatment in fifth grade. It is far better. The earlier the treatment occurs, the better it is for everyone - and especially the child. Yet the fact remains that it is treatment, and not prevention. Prevention can only begin at home - the place where language shapes the way children see and make their way in the world.
How can you prevent the education crisis?
In order to develop in natural and healthy ways, children need love and language. They need appropriate affection and affirmation that encourages them to explore, take appropriate risks, express curiosity, and take age-appropriate responsibility for their actions. They also need a language-rich environment in which words are used to inquire, explore, understand, celebrate, lovingly correct, and honor. In the presence of love and language, children flourish. If a child's development falters in the presence of love and language, it is a likely sign of a disability of some sort - which can then be helpfully and quickly addressed by medical and educational professionals.
Love and language are not privileged by income, class, ethnicity, or geography. Any parent can provide a loving, language-rich environment. Emily Dickinson captured it well in this poem:
He ate and drank the precious words,When parents invite their children into this kind of use of language, that is prevention - not treatment.
His spirit grew robust,
He knew no more that he was poor,
Or that his frame was dust.
He danced along the dingy ways
And this bequest of wings
Was but a book. What liberty
A loosened spirit brings!
