When kindergarten teachers and parents are first introduced to developmentally appropriate practices (DAP), there are questions that typically arise. The following are a sampling of some of the most frequently asked questions concerning DAP.
Q. Shouldn't we encourage parents to keep their child at home to mature for another year if the child is not ready for kindergarten?
A. If the environment and curriculum are developmentally appropriate, no child who is age appropriate is developmentally inappropriate. By definition, a developmentally appropriate setting meets the needs of all children. A developmental curriculum is designed to fit the needs of each child, in contrast to traditional kindergarten curriculum into which we try to fit all children. When the curriculum and program are appropriate, even those children who might have experienced difficulty in a traditional kindergarten program benefit by school participation. These are the children who most need to be in school where they are being stimulated and challenged.
Q. If it was good enough for me, it is good enough for my children! Why do we need to change how we teach children?
A. The issue today in American education is our ability to meet the challenge of an increasingly complex world. As educators and parents, it is our goal to prepare children for the world of tomorrow, not the world of yesterday. We are not advocating that we throw everything out that we now do with young children, but that we look more carefully at how young children learn. What we know about how young children grow and learn has increased over the past fifty years. We now must incorporate all of that good information into what we do to facilitate learning.
There are good reasons to begin to use what we know. The business world is looking for individuals with very different skills from those required of workers twenty years ago. The Fortune 500 companies published a list of most desired skills in 1990. The top five skills in order of importance were team work, problem solving, interpersonal skills, oral communication and listening. They no longer want workers who just follow directions and do what they're told as they complete repetitive tasks.
The world of work is changing in other significant ways as well. We can no longer rest easy in the knowledge that if a child doesn't "make it" in school, there will be a factory or farm that will provide the child with a means to make a living. Those days are quickly passing. Even the farm and factory jobs that are left require a level of understanding about technology and teaming beyond the abilities of a many school drop-outs.
It is our responsibility to see that children from wide varieties of backgrounds and abilities are prepared to be productive citizens. In order to prepare students to assume productive roles in our society, we must address the individual learning needs of every child, not just those children who come to school fitting neatly into our curriculum. We must add to the rich legacy of skill and knowledge acquisition those skills that will enable our children to survive and thrive in a rapidly changing world. In addition, we need to be sure that they leave us with skills for lifelong learning because, we know that few people go through life in one job or career any more.
So while much of what children do in school today is built on what you as adults did when you were in school, it is being added to as we learn more about learning and child development and as the outside world changes in significant ways.
Q. Students today just want to be entertained. We have to get children ready to be students, to sit still and pay attention. Isn't it our responsibility to get kids ready to meet the challenges of the next grade?
A. Many kindergarten students are not developmentally ready to sit still for long periods of time. Learning to sit still is a lot like learning to walk. Parents wait with anticipation for their baby's first steps, but they can't force the baby to walk before she is ready. The ability to sit still develops in much the same way in preschool and primary level students. It's not that young students are bad or wish to disobey their teachers. Their developmental level makes it impossible for them to sit quietly and listen for longer than 10 or 15 minutes at a time. Usually by the time a child is in second grade her attention span has increased considerably and she is ready to begin sitting for longer periods of time.
Kindergarten students learn concepts best if we teach them in a manner which is appropriate to their developmental level. They need many experiences which are activity-oriented and which begin with the manipulation of concrete objects. The five year old is still developing language skills. When we ask her to spend much of her time listening instead of interacting with peers and adults, we limit her opportunity to hear and use language. Muscles and bones, visual and auditory channels are still developing. We are not working with a "finished product" to which we just need to add a few finishing touches! It is very necessary that we understand these developmental issues and provide experiences that make it possible for the child to best integrate new skills and knowledge in a way that is appropriate for where the child is.
Our responsibility is to help each child to grow and learn as much as they can in the months that we have them. At each grade level, our first duty is to our children, not to the teacher at the next grade level. If we can produce kindergarten students who, are excited about school and learning, who look forward with confidence to using newly learned skills in the next grade or level and beyond, we have fulfilled our main responsibility.
Q. How expensive will this approach be to implement?
A. Many districts already have much of the equipment and supplies necessary to implement DAP. In some cases, it necessitates looking at existing equipment in new and different ways such as, rearranging furniture so that interest areas are defined and desks are put together to form work surfaces; pulling manipulatives, paper, and art supplies out of cupboards and putting them in children's reach on shelves; etc. If the district needs further supplies or equipment, it might reallocate some of the money used to order workbooks and put it toward the purchase of developmental materials. The district might solicit donated used toys and manipulatives from families whose children have outgrown them. It might present a "wish list" to PTA and community organizations. Some equipment(shelving, easels and tables) might be made in junior and senior high shop classes. These concerns are really the easy part of implementing DAP.
The most cost intensive aspect of implementation of developmentally appropriate practices is providing the training, technical assistance and time for staff to meet for planning and reflection as they make on-going change. These expenses may require that a district rethink how it spends training dollars. Creative scheduling may provide planning time without additional expense. One of the most important ingredients in successful implementation of DAP costs little, but requires thoughtful planning, commitment and dedication. That ingredient is the unflagging support of a district or program's administration. Without knowledgeable and supportive administrators, teachers burn out and the change process gets bogged down in conflicting messages and goals.
Q. How am I going to find time to make all of these changes?
A. Change should be a gradual process taken in increments which are comfortable for those who must implement them. It is helpful if teachers have the opportunity to sit together to share ideas and to plan. Each teacher does not have to have all of the materials necessary to implement a developmental program. A sharing of equipment and materials through rotation from teacher to teacher is an efficient way of disseminating ideas and materials. Teachers might solicit assistance from PTA and community organizations to construct or buy learning games and materials. They might use parent and community volunteers and peer tutors to provide assistance with students in the developmental program.
And of course, the support of administration is absolutely necessary! Without someone advocating at the administrative level for release time, teachers may not find the time to meet and plan. Training and technical assistance necessary to continue to add new skills and understandings may be non-existent. Again, burn-out and backsliding may result.
Q. What about state mandates to teach so many minutes each day of math, reading, science, etc.?
A. Many states do not mandate minutes of instruction per subject area per day. They mandate that a total number of hours of instruction occur in each subject area in a year. How a teacher or district chooses to apportion those minutes is an individual choice. Some of the best instruction occurs when teachers and children become immersed in an activity or lesson which cannot be quantified by minutes expended, and that arbitrary period breaks interfere with this type of immersion. As a result, districts are encouraged to meet the state mandate, but in creative ways which allow teachers to be flexible in the scheduling of subjects and activities. For example, a gross motor activity on the play ground which incorporates the teaching of number concepts could be counted as minutes in physical education and mathematics.
Q. I've been in education for a long time and DAP doesn't look new to me. How is DAP different from what we did in kindergartens back in the '40s and '50s?
A. Developmentally Appropriate Practice doesn't look different from the kindergarten classroom of the '50s. Many of the materials and activities are the same. The difference lies in the fact that in the developmentally appropriate, child-centered classroom, the needs of all children are met. In the '50s if a child arrived in kindergarten reading, she stepped back and participated in all of the prereading activities in which the other children were involved and put off learning to read until first grade. In the developmental kindergarten, a child who is ready to read and enjoys reading is taught reading skills. The child who is not ready to learn his letters is involved in prereading activities which develop visual, auditory, and motor skills which will prepare him to learn letters later. Individual differences are met through skill groups and learning areas which are stocked with materials which meet a variety of learning styles and levels.
Q. If we're teaching students at many different levels in kindergarten, what happens to them when they get to first grade?
A. Students have always been sent to first grade from traditional programs at many different skill levels. There never has been a magic wand that transformed a class of diverse learners into a homogenous group. The danger is that teachers may forget that this diversity has always existed. When a different approach is implemented, this diversity may be attributed to the approach.
A developmentally appropriate approach should not end because children have moved on to first grade. A mismatch between curriculum, teaching strategies and child development may be present throughout the primary grades. Teachers of young children need to begin to share what they know about children and young learners with other teachers. Some school districts have instituted mixed-grade teacher study groups where teachers are given time to investigate together information about best practice for young children. Training that includes a mix of grade levels may also facilitate this process.
Q. I teach in a district which is integrated with equal numbers of Black and White students. How does developmentally appropriate practice apply in my circumstance?
A. The inclusion of instruction around multicultural issues should be an important component of any approach. Early childhood teachers should develop sensitivity to and insight about children of various backgrounds. Early childhood educators need to help children develop positive self-concepts and group identities without feeling superior or inferior to other ethnic groups.
All children develop in a sequential, predictable pattern, regardless of ethnic background. Because developmentally appropriate, child-centered practice addresses individual learning needs and styles with a heightened sensitivity to the ethnic background of the child, it requires that the teacher know every child as the individual he/she is. Based upon this knowledge and what the teacher knows about learning, they design experiences that facilitate learning taking culture and ethnicity into consideration.
Q. Isn't this approach really just "dumbing-down" the curriculum so that "slower" children can catch up?
A. If a program is truly developmental, it takes children from where they are developmentally and provides experiences to challenge each of them. In a developmental classroom, much less time is spent teaching children in a whole group. The classroom provides a balance of whole group, small group and individual activity with periods of quiet work and active exploration. It is equipped with a wide variety of rich learning materials which children use in different ways dependent upon their prior knowledge, their interest and/or the teacher's determination. Children are encouraged to actively explore these materials and interact with children and adults in the room in order to acquire skills, knowledge and explore interests.
Materials are concrete, three-dimensional and are open-ended allowing children to use them very differently based upon their developmental level. For instance, blocks may be manipulated and stacked by young children, but become rich resources for exploring number relationships, geometry and other math concepts for older children. Each child is seen as an individual with unique strengths and needs. It is the teacher's role to identify those strengths and needs and to tailor opportunities and challenges for learning and growth for each child no matter what his developmental level. So, no, DAP is not "dumbing-down" the curriculum! To quote a famous children's book character, "It's not too hard or too soft. It's juuussst right!" Goldie Locks and the Three Bears
